[StBernard] Rebuilding St. Bernard: A Series On Residents Returning Home

[Westley Annis]

When Kenny and Nina Desselle first saw their home in Lexington Place
subdivision in Meraux after Hurricane Katrina they didn't think it would be
possible to rebuild.
The furnishings in the home in the 2700 block of Maylfower Drive, "was in a
tumult, like it had been in a washing machine,'' said Nina Desselle. "it was
so bad.''
 
At least 10 feet of water engulfed the residence, flooding the attic.
 
But as they came back several times they found that beneath the muck their
floor was okay and they decided to see what could be done.
 
"We gutted the house in October before gutting was a word in St. Bernard,''
said Kenny Desselle, who works at Domino Sugar in Arabi.
 
Fortunately, he had a trailer to live in at Domino just after the storm
which gave Desselle a chance to go back and forth to work on his home, doing
almost all the renovation himself. "We worked on it every day.''
 
And by June the place was ready for the couple to move back in.
 
There were few other families in the neighborhood early on but now that the
Desselles have finished renovating, including installing their own street
light out front, others are starting to move back into the area.
 
They feel like they have helped attract them by getting their home ready to
live in.
"We won't be alone,'' Nina Desselles said. 
 
The couple said their biggest complaints are the lack of enough street
lighting throughout the neighborhood and a problem in getting the Federal
Emergency Management Agency to remove a trailer that stands in front of
their home even though they don't need it anymore. 
 
Kenny Desselle said many of his co-workers who lived in St. Bernard moved
away and some even initially made fun of him for attempting to rebuild. Now,
ones living across the lake are starting to complain about the ride back and
forth, he said, while he finds "there's very little traffic'' on his way to
Domino in the morning.
 
"It's nice here,'' Nina Desselle said. "We've become a small town.''