When Cheri Faucheux woke up on Friday morning, the first thing she did was go outside to check on her friends in the neighborhood.
According to the National Weather Service, Thursday night’s torrential rainfall dumped up to 12 inches of water in St. Charles Parish within 90 minutes. The rain caused more than 200 homes to flood.
Faucheux, who lives on Destrehan Drive, said her home was spared in the flooding but that she is surrounded by neighbors who weren’t as fortunate.
“It was right there,” she said of the rising water. “It was so close.”
The first friend she checked on is the mother of two small children. Overwhelmed with feeling like she couldn’t do anything to help, Faucheux told her friend the least she could do was to feed them lunch.
Then she had an idea.
Faucheux hopped on Facebook and asked her virtual friends if they’d like to donate $10 for her to order pizzas and deliver them to residents who flooded.
Money started pouring in.
“I bought 40 pizzas the first round,” she said. “I also got cases of water and bags of chips, but it was going quick, so I ordered another 35.”
Faucheux said many of the residents who flooded had friends and family members over at their homes helping them to clean up, so it added to the number of people to feed.
“But the money kept coming in,” she said.
Faucheux visited Krispy Kreme on Friday with the intent to purchase donuts for people to eat on Saturday morning. But when she explained to the manager why she needed so many donuts, Faucheux said what he did shocked her.
“He just started loading my car up,” she said.
In total, Krispy Kreme donated 140 dozen donuts – roughly $1,500 worth of breakfast – for flood victims.
Determined to continue to help flood victims and use every dollar that was donated, Faucheux distributed Powerade and chips on Saturday and on Sunday passed out goody bags filled with treats and various home air fresheners.
“Over 70 people have stepped up and dipped into their wallets and helped in any way they could,” she said. “And half of these people are not from this parish … can you even imagine after 60 days on lockdown that the day we are able to start to get back to normal you are hit with an even worse problem?”
Faucheux said she is overwhelmed with gratitude for all the donors who have made it possible for her to spread some joy to people who are going through so much.
On one delivery run, Faucheux said a young boy was crying because he couldn’t understand why his mom was throwing away all his toys. On another delivery, a homeowner asked Faucheux to place a case of donated water on her truck’s tailgate. Faucheux said the bed of the truck was filled with family photos the owners were trying to dry and salvage.
“People keep thanking me, but I keep telling them, ‘your community to doing this for you … I’m just the delivery person,’” she said. “It makes them feel good that the community is behind them.”
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