Sandy's Home During Rebuilding

“We arrived in New Orleans on December 30^th and began working on New Year’s Eve.  We teamed up with St. Bernard’s Project and went to the house of a woman named Sandy who had been living in a trailer in her front yard for seven years since Katrina. Her husband decided to rebuild their home, but died of a heart attack during the process.  That was about 5 years ago.  Sandy couldn’t afford to finish rebuilding her home and approached St. Bernard’s Project and asked for help.  They agreed to help her, but what they didn’t realize is that the house had been built with tainted drywall.  This meant that all the walls had to be redone.  Next, they found that the beams had been eaten by termites and essentially their whole house had to be redone.  We spent the days painting the entire outside of the house.  We also spackled most of the walls and whatever else needed plastering.  Sandy was so grateful for all of our help; at the end she gave us all necklaces to thank us.  It was really nice to see the person behind the house and to see that the house was going to be completed and that she was going to move into a home after 7 years. Her home should be ready around Mardi Gras.”

Rachel Kaplan