We met Clarice Friloux through my cousin, Maxx Sizeler and her partner, Bea Calvert. Bea’s mother, Mercedes Calvert, was an interview we conducted in Metarie, Lousiana, and she had said we should really talk to her niece who had led a fight against an oil company and won.
The case, for obvious reasons, drew a lot of attention nationwide. She is from the Houma Tribe of Native Peoples and has openly fought to have the waste of the oil industry dealt with, primarily because it is often dumped in her backyard.
Literally.
In open pits which have become aeromatic causing respiratory issues like asthma, bloody sinus conditions and making people in her community sick. She ultimately settled out of court with the oil company about ten years ago, where they were required to build berms around the site, and eventually cap it.
Ten years have passed and nothing has changed. People are still getting sick. And potentially (if the winds are right ) a gigantic oil spill will be headed right in her direction with no protection or natural buffer because the same oil companies have dug many canals rendering any natural possible hydrological exchange impossible. These canals and pipelines have decimated the marshland. What was once, according to Mercedes, endless brackish marsh with no glimpse of the Gulf, is now all salt water for as far as the eye can see. All because of the fourth element in the manufacture of oil: transportation ( The other elements being extraction, marketing and storage. ) please watch the posted video….
OIL IN THE FAMILY 