Coming Home: A Journey Back from Atlanta 

Release Date: August 21, 2006
Release Number: 1603-527b

» More Information on Louisiana Hurricane Katrina

NEW ORLEANS, La. -- It was a good thing that Jeanell Holmes saw the movie “Their Eyes Were Watching God,” before Hurricane Katrina. Otherwise, she might not have evacuated from her home in the historical Holy Cross section of the Lower 9th Ward.

“My family is from the Hurricane Betsy era,” said Holmes. “We never thought about leaving. We prepare with batteries and water and life rafts, but we don’t leave.” But as Katrina approached, Holmes remembered a scene from the Oprah-produced movie of rats and snakes coming out in floodwaters. That image in her mind, combined with the news reports, convinced her she needed to make the eight-hour drive to stay with her sister in Atlanta.

She packed two days worth of clothes and took the deed to her home and a copy of a business plan for a restaurant she planned to open. “It sounds odd, but I grabbed the business plan,” said Holmes, who had her own silk-screening business at the time. Disaster experts recommend that evacuees pack enough food, water and clothing for three days as well as important documents, such as birth certificates, marriage licenses and insurance information.

In Holmes’ case, her paperwork not only made it easier to receive disaster assistance, but the house deeds she took with her had symbolic meaning. She had personally renovated her historical home seven years earlier. The peach and white gingerbread shotgun house had been vacant for 11 years when she bought it and Holmes acted as the contractor, getting all the supplies wholesale.

When she returned after the hurricane, she remembers seeing nothing but a gray wash of desertion with the sound of helicopters flying overhead. “It was grueling,” she said. “The only colors were in my car. Everything outside was brown and gray – cracked soil, downed power lines and water.” Holmes’ house was still standing, but its floors had warped and the furniture floated into tattered piles all over the rooms. “I stood in the doorway and thought to myself, ‘I have no brothers and I’m not married…what am I going to do?”

Holmes thought about relocating to Atlanta, but the pull of home was too strong. “The entire time I saw what was happening on TV I didn’t cry,” she said. “It didn’t really hit me until I was driving back to New Orleans for the first time. That’s when I heard Garland Robinette on WWL, and I just lost it. It was a familiar voice from home…and every time I heard everyone call me honey.”

Holmes stayed in Atlanta for three months, receiving rental assistance from FEMA and working as a secretary part-time in a hospital, which allowed her to drive back to New Orleans every two weeks to work on her house. “I cleaned it out one trash bag at a time,” she said.

“It helped that someone from the Salvation Army would drive past every three hours to check on the people who were working on their homes. Each time I returned, the more determined I became to move back.”

With a $10,500 housing repair grant from FEMA, Holmes continues to work on her prized home, having the sheetrock taken out and the wiring changed. “Almost every night, I leave work and drive to the house to check on it or do something,” she said. And then she drives home to a FEMA travel trailer group site near the river in the Garden District. “I have a view of the river and I hear the animals in the morning from the Audubon Park. It’s quite pleasant,” she said.

She still has that business plan she took with her and hopes to open her restaurant – specializing in chicken wings with New Orleans spices – in the next year or two. In the meantime, she has a job at FEMA’s New Orleans office where she is a case manager, helping others like herself find a place to live back home.

FEMA manages federal response and recovery efforts following any national incident. FEMA also initiates mitigation activities, works with state and local emergency managers, and manages the National Flood Insurance Program. FEMA became part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on March 1, 2003.

Last Modified: Friday, 25-Aug-2006 16:25:56