Sinkhole exodus now extends beyond Assumption Parish

27th April 2015   ·   0 Comments

By Susan Buchanan
Contributing no credit check cash loans Writer

After the Bayou Corne sinkhole opened in August 2012, 182 houses and businesses were under mandatory evacuation orders from Assumption Parish. A two-acre hole appeared when a salt dome operated by Texas Brine Co. was breached and invaded by surrounding sediment. Methane gas was released. The gap eventually swelled to 31 acres. The closest neighbors were half a mile away.

In the years since the disaster began, what’s happened to the residents of Sportsman’s Drive, Sauce Piquant Lane, and Jambalaya and Crawfish Stew Streets there? “An estimated 330 residents have moved away, with about half of them staying in the parish and probably half going outside of it,” John Boudreaux, Assumption Pa­rish homeland security director, said last week. Former residents keep in touch with his office for sinkhole updates.

Neighbors took one of several legal routes, Texas Brine spokes­man Sonny Cranch said last week. Sixty-six property owners settled directly with Texas Brine and moved away. Thirteen residents opted out of litigation and remain in their Bayou Corne homes now. Eighty-seven property owners are part of a class-action suit and have moved. Others have pursued their own lawsuits. The exodus from Bayou Corne wound down in February, Cranch said.

Last August, U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey in New Orleans ap­proved a $48.1 million class-action settlement for claims from residents and businesses. Before that, Texas Brine began making settlement offers directly to residents in mid-2013 in personal loan suggestion a process that ended last fall.

The class action suit claims that defendant Texas Brine caused the sinkhole and is responsible for damages that residents and business sustained because of the hole and the mandatory evacuation. Buyouts have ranged from about $40,000 for mobile homes to over $775,000 for new houses on large land parcels. Twenty-five percent of the $48.1 million, or $12.03 million, was set aside for attorneys’ fees. Additionally, fees will be paid to a court-appointed special master, A. Shelby Easterly III in Denham Springs. Easterly, who is able to recommend his own master’s pay, has put it at over $1 million plus expenses.

In early April, Judge Zainey held a hearing focused on grievances from some of the class-suit plaintiffs. “A handful of vocal members of the class complained to the judge that 25 percent in attorneys’ fees is too high,” Cranch said. “But the fees were among the terms originally agreed on in the class suit.” Cranch said some class members also had complained to Zainey that the lawyers had bullied them into accepting aspects of that settlement.

A number of law firms are involved in the class-action suit. “Nineteen firms will split the 25 percent in attorneys’ fees,” Larry Centola of Martzell & Bickford in New Orleans said last week. “The portions haven’t been decided yet.” Centola is a class counsel in the sinkhole suit.

In early March, Louisiana Lawsuit Abuse cash advance west lafayette in Watch said 25 percent of the multi-million-dollar settlement would amount to over $1,344 an hour in what it termed “a whopping $12 million in litigation fees.”

Meanwhile, what’s the status of the hole? “Seismic activity has been up since January,” Boudreaux said. “Not much has been seen at the surface, however, aside from a few trees leaning over on the east side. The old South Berm continues to subside on the south side.” Boudreaux said the parish is responsible for public safety around the hole, while parish and state personnel are on the alert for any indications of gas. “Shallow gas is still present below homes,” he said.

Cranch said most of the underground gas exited the Bayou Corne area through vent wells installed in recent years. And according to Texas Brine, geological studies have found no subsurface voids that could threaten residents. The hole’s shape has remained fairly consistent over the past year, the company has said.

Why did people move? “Some residents were concerned about gas, though most of it had been removed by early this year,” Cranch said. Other worries included surface instability, health and safety—particularly of children and seniors, and declining property values. “It was a mixed community of families, retirees, homeowners, renters and people with camps used part time,” Cranch said.

After the evacuation was announced, Texas Brine paid everyone but the camp owners $875 a week. The checks started on August 17, 2012, whether people stayed or not, and continued into this winter. Cranch explained that a mandatory evacuation isn’t as strict as a forced one. “Under a mandatory evacuation, you can stay at your own risk,” he said. Before the settlements, about 45 percent of residents chose to remain rather than decamp to homes of relatives or to motels. By now, however, most of them have moved away.

As for businesses, Boudreaux said a small beauty salon in the only one he knows of that moved.

On a recent Saturday, about 50 fishermen were out at Bayou Corne, Cranch said. “In south Louisiana, it’s long been considered a good fishing hole,” he said. Texas Brine hasn’t decided what to do with the property it acquired there through settlements with residents.

On April 8, Texas Brine filed a complaint against Michigan-based Dow Chemical Co. in U.S. District Court in New Orleans, saying that the length of one foot between a Dow cavern at Bayou Corne and Texas Brine property is preventing it from mining salt in several caverns. Under a state rule adopted in 2014, mined brine caverns must be 200 feet apart.

Brine, or water saturated with salt, is used to produce chlorine and caustic soda, which in turn are harnessed to purify water and make plastics, paper, pharmaceuticals and chemicals.

This article originally published in the April 27, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.