John's Observations on Chalmette's Community

Chalmette had an overwhelming sense of community before they were hit by Katrina.  When we talked to the firemen, they said that everybody knew everybody and there was a huge sense of community in the area before the storm.  However, since the storm the landscape of Chalmette has greatly changed.  The city of Chalmette still is a blue collar, lower class working community, but the landscape of the community has greatly changed since the storm.  One Firefighter estimated that only 50% of the the previous population returned home to Chalmette, and the other 50% of their population is now made up of workers from other areas that are now moving in.  Poverty seems to be a problem, and the social relationships here seem to be based on very old friendships and trust.  One relationship we observed was in a bar on a weeknight.  The bar only had 3 or 4 old men in it, and the bartender knew all of them very well.   At the other bars we went to later in the week, we noticed the same thing.  Lots of the people in the bars knew eachother and seemed to have a close bond with the people they were there with.  The relationships there all seemed to be between people who looked very similar.  The were almost all white, and some of them looked a little "raggedy" or dirty.  This could either be a sign of poor living conditions or a sign of them not caring about their appearance - since they are only around friends.  The community centers in Chalmette don't really exist - the closest thing they have to that is their bars.  Aside from Bars, the greatest concentration of people seem to hang out at nail salons, restaurants and coffee shops.  We didn't really see any Boys & Girls Clubs or areas like that for kids to hang out, but they are building a brand new Middle School which goes up to grade 9.  The school looks very nice and it plans on having lots of state of the art technology inside of it.  Hopefully that will prove to be a large center of local community.  

Katrina's effect on Chalmette - Bruce

Hurricane Katrina has affected Chalmette more than any other part of Louisiana. Chalmette was 100%, completely wiped out from the hurricane. People lost everything. Houses were knocked off the slabs, and everything was lost. Some of the firemen from the local fire station told us their stories of life after the storm, and it wasn't pretty. They were without power, and they had very limited amounts of water. Food was scarce, and they did what they had to do to survive. There wasn't much looting going on in Chalmette, because everything was underwater. They told us about how they have to bathe with bottles of water. They called it the"20 ounce shower." Many of the population did not return after the storm, actually about 50% . Most of the people who did not return had nothing to come back to, so they simply decided to start over somewhere else, where this tragedy could not happen again. The people who did come back are die-hard Chalmatians. Even if they had nothing, many of them came back because St. Bernard Parish was all that they knew. They lived and breathed Chalmette for their entire lives, and they would not let a "little water" force them to abandon their hometown forever.

Observations-Ben

Chalmette's economy depends heavily on the oil industry, specifically on the refineries that surround the town. Most residents still work in the area, but a number of those employed in Chalmette commute to work from their new post-Katrina home.
Interestingly, Chalmette is, by a far majority, a white town. There doesn't seem to be much segregation within Chalmette, but also consider the town's proximity to the 9th ward. Chalmette may have been intially created to help move New Orleans suburbanites out of the city and away from black communities.
Many have been dependent on FEMA relief checks for money, and some have trouble working their pre-Katrina jobs as they no longer exist. For the most part though, there doesn't seem to be any direct evidence to suggest there's much poverty in Chalmette. Most of the residents have jobs and/or homes in town. The poorest residents were hit hard by Katrina, most haven't moved back.

Pictures from the Chalmette parade

History of Chalmette

Chalmette is located just east outside New Orleans in St. Bernard Parish, surrounded by the Mississippi on one side and marshland on the other. Named after plantation owner Martin de Lino de Chalmette, it was the site of the historic Battle of New Orleans, fought in 1815 during the war of 1812. In this battle Andrew Jackson led American troops in a defense against the British attacking from the sea. The Americans had geography in their favor as the British had to cross through the swamps in their attack. Jackson’s army defeated the British, which forever ended any attempts by the British to take control of America. Today, tourists can visit the Chalmette Battlefield, which serves as a monument to the battle. Also at the site is the Beauregard House, built in 1830 but never used as a plantation. It now is used as a visitor’s center and museum. Next to the Battlefield is the Chalmette National Cemetery, which honors soldiers on both sides who died in the Civil War, including the famous Buffalo Soldiers.
Hurricane Katrina in August 2005 had a major impact on Chalmette and all of St. Bernard Parish. The Parish is surrounded on all sides by water and is two thirds of its land consists of marshlands from the Mississippi River Delta. The elevation is either at sea level or below sea level, placing it in a very precarious situation during hurricane seasons. When Katrina hit the entire parish was submerged and water level rose to seventeen feet high and above in some places. Since many people take a lot of pride in their community, many did not evacuate for Katrina and were therefore trapped in their houses as the water levels rose. However, those that stayed behind and were able to help rose the occasion remarkably. One group that was instrumental in the relief effort was the St. Bernard Fire Department.

Janna's Field Notes

We first visited Chalmette on a Sunday afternoon. The town seemed pretty deserted and our first planned stop, the family restaurant Rocky’s, was closed; not a very good sign. We proceeded to a bar called RC’s Tavern, which was also fairly empty. The bartender told us that on Sundays the town sort of shuts down because most people go to church. When we asked her where people hung out around Chalmette she told us bars or nail salons. The impression that I got from the bartender was that she thought Chalmette was a decent, maybe a little boring, town with hardworking people and a very close community. Next we stopped at one of the three fire houses in Chalmette. The firefighters we met and talked to were very welcoming and friendly. We mostly discussed the effects of Hurricane Katrina on Chalmette. Apparently St Bernard Parish was one of the few parishes that was completely, 100% destroyed by Katrina. It’s not surprising when you look at a map of Chalmette and see that it’s boxed in by swamp land. The firefighters, like pretty much all of Louisiana, are pretty distrustful of the government and especially FEMA. When asked how Chalmette is different now than from pre-Katrina one of them answered that it was just the little things, like how some neighborhoods still have dozens of vacant lots where houses have been destroyed, how they still don’t have a Taco Bell or Walmart, or how not all of the firehouses have reopened. After the firehouse, we drove to the Chalmette Battlefield where the Battle of New Orleans was fought in 1815.
When we went back on Tuesday, this time with the whole group, we decided to hit up Rocky’s to observe the type of people that lived in Chalmette. From our observations it seems that Chalmette is comprised mostly of white working-class people. At the restaurant the close, family feel of the community that we were previously told about could be seen. A lot of people seemed to know each other and everyone was really friendly. Afterwards, we went back to RC’s Tavern. However, the bartender who was working on Sunday wasn’t there and the new one wouldn’t let anyone under twenty-one stay inside. So after awkwardly hanging around outside while our other group members were inside, we went to another bar. This bar was much friendlier than the other and we talked to the customers a bit. Like almost everyone we talked to, they discussed mostly Katrina, its effects on the parish, and their contempt for FEMA. After turning down their offers to do karaoke, we decided it was time to go home.