BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – This week marks the eighth anniversary of the 2016 flood, and many Baton Rouge residents remember it like it was yesterday. One family is still dealing with the aftermath years later, after repairs to their home are falling apart.
After the flood, the Louisiana Office of Community Development’s Restore Louisiana Program hired a contractor called IEM to oversee much of the reconstruction of the flooded homes. The main contractor then hired a subcontractor to do the actual work in Baton Rouge.
“Back to the starting point, it’s like we’re back in the middle of the flood, all over again,” said Catrina Toy.
During the 2016 flood, Catrina Toy and her husband Reggie’s home was under several inches of water. They decided to use the Restore Louisiana program to make repairs.
“We entrusted our house to these contractors to make it livable again. That was less than 10 years ago. Six years later, I’m supposed to replace all the floors in my house? That’s heartbreaking,” Toy said.
She says the problems with her house started before the work was completed.
“We had problems before we were even close to finished. They would just come, start working and then disappear for weeks,” Toy said.
Toy says the family was promised the repairs would be completed in 90 days, but it turned into a year and a half. Shortly after everything was completed, the problems started to show.
“When they were supposedly done with the punch list, because we communicated back and forth with them and did the regulations and inspections to make sure everything they said they would do was done and it was done right, the flooring was never right. It never stuck like it was supposed to, the floors were jumping up, so it was never done right from day one,” Toy said.
In October 2019, the Toy family filed a warranty claim through Restore after noticing that the floor in the living room was soft.
“They promised us that if we made a warranty claim, they would come back and fix or check anything that needed to be fixed. That never happened,” Toy said.
Six years later, they claim the entire subfloor of their house has problems.
“My husband always says, ‘Trin, the floor is cracking, the floor is cracking.’ You hear it, you hear it popping, you hear cracks, but he went right through here and the floor caved in. You never thought that could happen in your house, and the floor isn’t even 20 years old. It’s not even 10 years old and it just caves in. How, how is that possible? How is that even possible,” Toy said.
The couple has now paid out of their own pocket for someone else to rip out the broken flooring and replace it. Toy says the total repairs will cost over $40,000.
“The Great Flood was just one of my biggest teachers. It taught me patience, it taught me how to definitely stand up for myself and not let anyone just screw me over. It was a lot. Really,” Toy said.
We reached out to IEM to learn more. The Louisiana Office of Community Development shared this statement with WAFB:
While we cannot give you specific details on Ms. Toy’s file, Restore 2016 program participants were generally offered a one-year warranty on home repairs made by the program contractor under Solution 1 (Program-Managed Construction). The warranty is between the program’s Solution 1 contractor, IEM, and the homeowner.
After final acceptance of construction completion, each applicant received documentation and an explanation of the one-year warranty process and the eligible items covered in the home. The warranty documentation included the following information:
“The warranty start date is the date on which the program representative(s) determines that the work has been completed in accordance with the scope of work (regardless of any claims by the owner that the work has not been completed). The warranty period is one year from the warranty start date. During the warranty period, the home will be free from defects resulting from failure to comply with building codes or from other defects in materials or workmanship not covered by the building codes.”
The program did not/does not assist with deferred maintenance other than that required to ensure a livable home. In addition, the program is not aware of other similar issues and has always encouraged homeowners to resolve outstanding warranty issues with their contractors.
Please also note that the program only acts as a liaison for warranty-related questions and the IEM warranty team is responsible for any defects subsequently discovered during the warranty claim process.
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