美国国家公共电台 NPR--Why Louisiana residents struggle to get property insurance during hurricane season.

Why Louisiana residents struggle to get property insurance during hurricane season.

Transcript¹

Over the past two years, hurricane-related damage in Louisiana has caused some insurance companies to go out of business. Homeowners are coping with higher insurance costs.

LEILA FADEL, HOST:

Tens of thousands of people in Louisiana are scrambling² to get property insurance in the middle of hurricane season. Most big companies have quit covering the state's Gulf³ Coast. And smaller firms are going out of business after Louisiana endured two major hurricane strikes in the last two years. As NPR's Debbie Elliott reports, the insurance shake-up comes amid a slow-going disaster recovery.

DEBBIE ELLIOTT, BYLINE⁴: In Houma, La., the scars from last year's Hurricane Ida seem fresh. A strip mall grocery store is abandoned, its glass front knocked out. Signposts and gas station awnings⁵ are ripped away. And faded blue tarps cover buildings.

JONATHAN FORET: The downtown area really took a beating.

ELLIOTT: Jonathan Foret runs the South Louisiana Wetlands Discovery Center in Houma, a town of about 30,000 southwest of New Orleans. On a drive to meet with his insurance agent, he reflects on how the destruction has lingered.

FORET: I thought that it would become easier, but it's actually had more of a compounding effect of driving by those things and seeing them broken and destroyed every day. It's become more depressing than I thought it would be, you know?

ELLIOTT: His own home is still in need of repairs. A tarp is over his kitchen roof, awaiting a contractor⁶. Now, in the midst of hurricane season, he's facing a new complication after his property insurance company went under.

TRACEE BENNETT: Hey.

FORET: Hey.

ELLIOTT: His agent is Tracee Bennett at La-Terre Insurance Agency.

FORET: All right. So this came in the mail. I just want to make sure that all of these were paid up.

BENNETT: One of them is special.

FORET: Right.

BENNETT: So these are like the new Citizens policies. So these are the ones...

ELLIOTT: Citizens is the state-run Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corporation.

BENNETT: Right now, we still have people with damage from Ida. So if you have an open claim or damage that you're still repairing, Citizens is the only option that we have.

ELLIOTT: Her office has been scrambling to help hundreds of clients, like Foret, who have either had their insurance companies go bankrupt or not renew policies on the coast.

BENNETT: I've been in insurance since I can remember. And this is truly the low point of where I've seen it.

JIM DONELON: It's a crisis.

ELLIOTT: Louisiana Insurance Commissioner⁷ Jim Donelon.

DONELON: Probably a little less than Katrina and Rita, but very close.

ELLIOTT: After those devastating⁸ storms in 2005, most major national firms quit offering wind insurance in south Louisiana. The state turned to some 30 regional firms to fill the gap. But after $22 billion in losses from Category 4 hurricanes Laura in 2020 and Ida last year, it was just too much for some companies to handle.

DONELON: Unfortunately, a half-dozen of those have now gone into receivership.

ELLIOTT: Donelon is among the 140,000 Louisiana homeowners affected⁹. He says about half of those policies were taken over by other firms. But the burden is falling to Citizens, the state-run insurer of last resort.

DONELON: They're absorbing it, but it ain't pretty, as we speak, because they are being inundated¹⁰.

ELLIOTT: He predicts Citizens will have tripled its number of policies by the end of the year. And those government policies are more expensive than private insurers, whose rates have also increased. Adding to the pain, flood premiums¹¹ are also going up. Insurance agent Tracee Bennett.

BENNETT: I can tell you, down here, it has been crippling. Between that and this, this is hurting.

ELLIOTT: Houma, La., is a mostly working-class town in Terrebonne Parish, a region threaded with bayous that lead to the Gulf of Mexico on its south end. People work in the oil and gas industry, at ports and in seafood¹². The median household income in Houma is about $45,000. Jonathan Foret says that doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room to cope with the higher insurance costs, layered with inflation, the hurricane recovery and the ongoing¹³ threat from climate change.

FORET: We're in it. Like, we're in it in a way that is going to prevent people from being able to live along the coast.

ELLIOTT: You can see it in south Terrebonne, where schools and fire stations remain out of commission. Dozens of homes are abandoned and look just like they did a week after Ida struck, roofs torn off and furniture scattered¹⁴ in the wreckage¹⁵. Alex Kolker, a professor at the Louisiana University Marine¹⁶ Consortium in Cocodrie, says the higher costs of cleanup, rebuilding and now insuring could transform these towns.

ALEX KOLKER: I think it makes these areas much harder to live in and harder to have the kind of community where people would want to live. So I think that you look at, you know, the possibility of climate migration¹⁷ and people moving elsewhere.

ELLIOTT: Kolker says what's happening here should be a wake-up call.

KOLKER: The real issue is, it's not just a few isolated¹⁸ people in rural Terrebonne Parish. It's that this could be happening to so many people around the country in the not-too-distant future.

ELLIOTT: Fannie Celestine's (ph) experience after Hurricane Ida shows how people get displaced from their communities in a disaster. Her public housing apartment in Houma was condemned¹⁹ after Ida. She's 59 and lost just about all of her belongings²⁰.

FANNIE CELESTINE: It's kind of hard to talk about it without crying.

ELLIOTT: Because of a housing shortage near the coast, Celestine lived for months in a hotel a hundred miles away in Lafayette before moving into this FEMA trailer closer to home. It's on an isolated gravel²¹ field away from town with no public transportation.

CELESTINE: It's a place to stay. But I'm from Houma. And I would like to go back to where I'm from. Transportation, I don't. have that.

ELLIOTT: She's tired of depending on relatives to get her to the doctor or shopping and longs to get back to ordinary living, so does Jonathan Foret. And he spots a literal sign of normalcy on the back of a tractor trailer rig.

FORET: Look; it's a Mc'Donald's sign. What? I mean, we can't get insurance. But, look; they're replacing the Mc'Donald's arches, golden arches (laughter).

ELLIOTT: After nearly a year of seeing a hurricane-mangled golden arches on the corner, this repair gives him a glimmer²² of hope that things will get better.

Debbie Elliott, NPR News, Houma, La.

(SOUNDBITE OF OATMELLO AND LATE ERA'S "GOOD NIGHT")

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 scrambling   

v.快速爬行( scramble的现在分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞

参考例句：

• Scrambling up her hair, she darted out of the house. 她匆忙扎起头发，冲出房去。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• She is scrambling eggs. 她正在炒蛋。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 gulf   

n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂

参考例句：

• The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
• There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 awnings   

篷帐布

参考例句：

• Striped awnings had been stretched across the courtyard. 一些条纹雨篷撑开架在院子上方。
• The room, shadowed well with awnings, was dark and cool. 这间屋子外面有这篷挡着，又阴暗又凉快。

6 contractor   

n.订约人，承包人，收缩肌

参考例句：

• The Tokyo contractor was asked to kick $ 6000 back as commission.那个东京的承包商被要求退还6000美元作为佣金。
• The style of house the contractor builds depends partly on the lay of the land.承包商所建房屋的式样，有几分要看地势而定。

7 commissioner   

n.（政府厅、局、处等部门）专员，长官，委员

参考例句：

• The commissioner has issued a warrant for her arrest.专员发出了对她的逮捕令。
• He was tapped for police commissioner.他被任命为警务处长。

8 devastating   

adj.毁灭性的，令人震惊的，强有力的

参考例句：

• It is the most devastating storm in 20 years.这是20年来破坏性最大的风暴。
• Affairs do have a devastating effect on marriages.婚外情确实会对婚姻造成毁灭性的影响。

9 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

10 inundated   

v.淹没( inundate的过去式和过去分词 )；（洪水般地）涌来；充满；给予或交予（太多事物）使难以应付

参考例句：

• We have been inundated with offers of help. 主动援助多得使我们应接不暇。
• We have been inundated with every bit of information imaginable. 凡是想得到的各种各样的信息潮水般地向我们涌来。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 premiums   

n.费用( premium的名词复数 )；保险费；额外费用；（商品定价、贷款利息等以外的）加价

参考例句：

• He paid premiums on his life insurance last year. 他去年付了人寿保险费。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Moves are afoot to increase car insurance premiums. 现正在酝酿提高汽车的保险费。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 seafood   

n.海产食品，海味，海鲜

参考例句：

• There's an excellent seafood restaurant near here.离这儿不远有家非常不错的海鲜馆。
• Shrimps are a popular type of seafood.小虾是比较普遍的一种海味。

13 ongoing   

adj.进行中的，前进的

参考例句：

• The problem is ongoing.这个问题尚未解决。
• The issues raised in the report relate directly to Age Concern's ongoing work in this area.报告中提出的问题与“关心老人”组织在这方面正在做的工作有直接的关系。

14 scattered   

adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的

参考例句：

• Gathering up his scattered papers,he pushed them into his case.他把散乱的文件收拾起来，塞进文件夹里。

15 wreckage   

n.（失事飞机等的）残骸，破坏，毁坏

参考例句：

• They hauled him clear of the wreckage.他们把他从形骸中拖出来。
• New states were born out of the wreckage of old colonial empires.新生国家从老殖民帝国的废墟中诞生。

16 marine   

adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵

参考例句：

• Marine creatures are those which live in the sea. 海洋生物是生存在海里的生物。
• When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时，他自愿参加了海军陆战队。

17 migration   

n.迁移，移居，（鸟类等的）迁徙

参考例句：

• Swallows begin their migration south in autumn.燕子在秋季开始向南方迁移。
• He described the vernal migration of birds in detail.他详细地描述了鸟的春季移居。

18 isolated   

adj.与世隔绝的

参考例句：

• His bad behaviour was just an isolated incident. 他的不良行为只是个别事件。
• Patients with the disease should be isolated. 这种病的患者应予以隔离。

19 condemned   

adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He condemned the hypocrisy of those politicians who do one thing and say another. 他谴责了那些说一套做一套的政客的虚伪。
• The policy has been condemned as a regressive step. 这项政策被认为是一种倒退而受到谴责。

20 belongings   

n.私人物品，私人财物

参考例句：

• I put a few personal belongings in a bag.我把几件私人物品装进包中。
• Your personal belongings are not dutiable.个人物品不用纳税。

21 gravel   

n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石

参考例句：

• We bought six bags of gravel for the garden path.我们购买了六袋碎石用来铺花园的小路。
• More gravel is needed to fill the hollow in the drive.需要更多的砾石来填平车道上的坑洼。

22 glimmer   

v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光

参考例句：

• I looked at her and felt a glimmer of hope.我注视她，感到了一线希望。
• A glimmer of amusement showed in her eyes.她的眼中露出一丝笑意。