PORT VINCENT - Neighbors in one Port Vincent subdivision are trapped every time there is heavy rain, and want to know when a promised road project will come to fruition.

For those living past Old Mill Settlement Road, whenever it pours, drivers grip the steering wheel tighter. The road, located near where Colyell Creek feeds into the Amite River, often goes underwater when there are severe weather events, according to neighbors.

Annette Birdwell, a resident in the subdivision, has lived in the area for more than a decade. She said it is where she plans to retire, but she did not know about the flood problems when she moved in.

"The first year we moved here, it went under four times," Birdwell said.

On Tuesday, WBRZ visited the neighborhood, a couple days after a rainy weekend. That afternoon, meters on the ground shared water levels at the time still reached two feet along some parts of the road.

"We can't get to work, we park our vehicles at the road, at Highway 16," Birdwell said.

The flooding is so severe, some neighbors said they had purchased military trucks to carry people across the waters.

"By the time the river stage says we're starting to get in a warning level, at that point, we're over two feet deep, before it even hits the warning. By the time it actually gets to flood stage, we're usually at about six feet deep of water," Carter Lambert, a resident, said.

Lambert said the water keeps school buses, mail deliveries and sometimes even emergency vehicles from reaching the dozens of homes tucked away past Old Mill Settlement Road.

"During high water events, emergency vehicles have to get here. One of the elderly patients having some kind of medical complication, we've had to have the elderly patients taken out in the fire department's military vehicles," Lambert said.

In Feb. 2022, the Livingston Parish Council agreed to seek state or federal funding to fix the road and also mentioned seeking Hazard and Mitigation Grants from FEMA as well. During the 2023 Regular Session, state lawmakers allotted the parish $625,000 to cover the cost of engineering and design services in Act 397. In Nov. of that year, the parish passed a resolution for a contract with Forte & Tablada, an engineering group.

District 8 Councilman Dean Coates represents the residents near Old Mill Settlement Road. He told WBRZ, he thought the road had already been raised.

"In this particular area, it gets pretty deep at that section. Those people are pretty much landlocked," Coates said.

Coates said, he would be looking at additional sources of funding to get the project completed.

"We did just bond some roads to do a lot of road work throughout the parish, and this is a parish road, this would be a great candidate for that funding," Coates said.

The Parish President's Office confirmed to WBRZ in an email, the engineering and design work is complete and was submitted for FEMA's Hazard Mitigation Grant Program. The parish is also working with FEMA and GOHSEP to secure federal dollars for construction, and points to changes in FEMA's "Benefit Cost Analysis" requirements as a factor in the delay. The office say the "Benefit Cost Analysis" requirement is one of the final parts before funding for construction can be secured.

A statement from Parish President Randy Delatte reads in part,

"We understand the frustration residents experience during major rain events, and this project remains a priority for my administration. We will continue working closely with FEMA, GOHSEP, and our project team to move this project toward construction as quickly as possible."

As of the time of this article, there is no set timeline for when the funding might be secured.