Insurances woes in coastal Louisiana make hurricane recovery difficult

HOUMA, La. — The scars from last year's Hurricane Ida seem fresh – a strip mall grocery store is abandoned, its glass front knocked out; signposts and gas station awnings are ripped away; faded blue tarps cover buildings.

"The downtown area really took a beating," says Jonathan Foret, executive director of the South Louisiana Wetlands Discovery Center in Houma, a town of about 30,000 southwest of New Orleans. He points to boarded up historic storefronts and missing roofs.

Foret is surveying the lingering damage on a drive to see his insurance agent. He's among tens of thousands of Louisiana homeowners scrambling to find new property insurance in the midst of a new Atlantic hurricane season. Most major companies have quit covering the coast, and now smaller