Jacqueline Breaux [JB], is a Katrina evacuee from New Orleans, LA. JB is originally from Port Arthur, Texas. JB married a man who studied dentistry and eventually they moved to New Orleans for him to open his own practice. They reared three daughters in New Orleans. JB and this husband divorced in 1997. JB evacuated hurricane Katrina to her childhood home in Port Arthur where her father still resided. When hurricane Rita hit she evacuated in a caravan of family members including her eighty-two year old father in a twelve hour drive to her cousin’s home in Spring, Texas. JB expresses that this evacuation was the hardest ordeal of the entire Katrina/Rita experience.

Once JB was settled in Port Arthur after hurricane Katrina, her plan was to build her future in Port Arthur. Hurricane Rita destroyed her childhood home in Port Arthur along with her plans of building a life there. JB continued to live with the cousin in Spring, Texas until residents of the Greater New Orleans area were allowed to return to the West Bank where she resided before Katrina. At this point, she returned to her apartment in Harvey, Louisiana with her father. During this stay, JB faced long gas lines, closed gas stations, closed restaurants, long grocery lines, and no prospect of employment as a teacher. Subsequently, JB decided to seek employment in Texas. She is currently working in the Spring Independent School District and living in Tomball, Texas. She is comfortable with her current working and living situation. However, JB is confused as to what to do about her immediate future considering that her youngest daughter is living in the New Orleans area with her father who is only home on the weekends. The daughter is mainly being raised by her step mother. The daughter is adamant about staying in New Orleans to attend her pre-Katrina high school with her friends.

JB has researched employment and housing prospects and has discovered that she would not be able to sustain living in the New Orleans area. JB discusses what she sees is needed in the New Orleans area for growth and to encourage pre-Katrina residents to return. She sites economics, education, housing, and employment as areas that need improvement to bring about improving people’s lives in residing in the New Orleans area. JB sites that poverty struck Port Arthur hard in the 80’s as a result of the busting oil industry and consequently the city began to crumble and hurricane Rita worsened matters. For Port Arthur, JB hopes, “they get better leaders who are really concerned about the people, all people, not just a certain group of people.”