Jennings, LA – Feb 7-11, 2022

This week we have six young men from near Reading, PA, and six (mostly) older men from Virginia/Maryland area. So it’s a good mix of old artisans teaching young farmers new skills.

We had a momentary pause on Indira Francis’ house, waiting for the local inspectors to respond to our pleas for visits. Phil Helmuth and Indira herself helped us get that moving. Indira had raised one of them!! So that house has been in full swing most of the week, with our visiting plumber using his skills to hook up very wanting connections under the house, and our visiting electrician finishing up from the one that came last week. Some others finished preparing for sheet rock, which was delivered this morning. By the end of next week that house should be looking less like a chicken barn and more like what it was.

Tricia Stroder got a bit more help on the interior of her house, where two back rooms needed gutting, to dry now that the roof has been replaced. Our visiting plumber also repaired the kitchen sink drain there.

A new, larger house got roofed within the last two days: Stephanie Arceneaux’s, which also needed a back room gutted. Our work there is already done.

Tina Deshotel’s house continues to inch toward the finish line, with some burps and hiccups, initiated by Tina asking for details that, in some cases, cause work to have to be undone and redone. Our crew added a railing to the front stairs, a goodwill gesture for husband Vern, who had been having to use the back door to access the house, due to limitations on his mobility. The railing, and flattening of the paving stones there, is huge for Vern, who has suffered so much despair at seeing his house almost destroyed for the second time.

Today David King is leading the charge on a small trailer roof, which should not take long. We still hope for the next larger job to soon get signed on, which means finding the home owner as she recovers from major back surgery. The long-term recovery case workers will help us with this detail. 

Submitted by Christa Barth on behalf of the Jennings, LA team