By Kelsey Hammon

kelsey.hammon@leaderpub.com

 

Thursday afternoon, an electronic sign posted outside of the tent encampment that has housed hundreds displaced by Hurricane Harvey read ‘Shelter closed.’

Inside the encampment, the only people who appeared to remain were those clad in Emergency Management shirts. The crew seemed to be working to pack up items throughout the afternoon.

Since Sept. 15, the tent structures have been located in the parking lot of the Robert A. Bob Bowers Civic Center at 3401 Cultural Center Drive. The city’s original shelter, which is housed inside the civic center had flooded, so the city reached out to the state for help in setting up a refuge.

Several emergency management crews have been helping to operate the refuge, including FEMA and ABEL. Approximately 300 residents had been housed inside the tents. By Tuesday, approximately 50 remained checking out of the shelter and into transitional housing.

Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman said residents within the shelter had been assigned a case worker to help them find transitional housing outside of the tent.

“Everyone has been transitioned out of the shelter at the civic center as of today [Thursday],” Freeman said. “We are hoping we don’t have to take on any new residents.”

On Thursday, Freeman said emergency aid workers had begun working with about 64 residents in the Prince Hall Apartment Complex to find them transitional housing. The complex had been damaged in the hurricane and Freeman said until he was sure those residents would have a place to go, the shelter would remain standing as a precaution.

Since the tents were erected, Freeman said the structures had been more than just a refuge to those that utilized them.

“Once we got the tent shelters up, it gave people a sense of hope,” Freeman said. “It also was a type of normalcy, where they were able to get fed and work on getting their life back on track.”

Wrap around services and case managers were on site to help residents accomplish this.

“The point was always to find residents a better place to be and better housing,” Freeman said. “They [emergency aid response teams] have been working diligently to get folks to a better place, I think they have accomplished that.”

FEMA is supposed to continue efforts to place people in permanent housing in the days to come, Freeman said.

“I appreciate the citizens’ patients throughout this ordeal,” Freeman said. “It has been a trying time on everyone, but the resiliency of the citizens has been our strength.”