• A Confederate statue, which a La. city had decided to leave standing, was toppled by Hurricane Laura.
LAFAYETTE, La. – Hurricane Laura damaged a controversial Confederate monument in Lake Charles, Louisiana, after officials voted to keep the statue this month.
The Calcasieu Parish Police Jury voted Aug. 13 to let the South’s Defenders Monument remain on the grounds of a courthouse in Lake Charles. A Calcasieu Parish official said the parish had received 945 written responses from the public about the monument.
“Of the total responses, 878 were against relocating the monument and 67 were for relocating the monument,” Calcasieu Parish Administrator Bryan Beam said.
Twitter posts Thursday morning showed images of the monument with the general in pieces on the ground.
Dedicated in 1915, the monument honors Confederate soldiers from the area and other towns across the South. Parish officials had been taking public comments since late June about what to do with the statue amid calls around the country to remove Confederate monuments many see as symbols of racism.
Laura made landfall as a Category 4 storm early Thursday and was downgraded to a tropical storm by that afternoon, but not before dealing significant damage to parts of Louisiana and Texas. Although damage is widespread along portions of the Gulf Coast, FEMA Administrator Peter Gaynor says it’s less than what was feared.
“It looks like 1,000 tornadoes went through here. It’s just destruction everywhere,” said Brett Geymann, who rode out the storm with three family members in Moss Bluff, near Lake Charles, Louisiana. He described Laura passing over his house with the roar of a jet engine around 2 a.m.