The families of 12 Baton Rouge General Medical Center employees, or 44 people total, continue to take up residence on a floor of the hospital’s Mid City campus more than a week after the hospital began providing emergency shelter for them.
The hospital started taking in employees and their families on Sunday, Aug. 14, and at one point was housing 52 employees and their family members.
“When we heard that some of our employees were sleeping in cars or sleeping in crowded shelters, we put the word out through social media, rounded with our staff, and asked managers to call every member of their team to account for everyone so we could understand their situation and help them in any way we could,” says Paul Douglas, the hospital’s vice president of human resources.
The hospital has dubbed the area “Hotel Champagne” after Louis Champagne, one of Baton Rouge General’s human resources directors who is credited with taking the lead to making the accommodations.
The hospital is providing some displaced staff members money from an employee assistance fund it has created, and is also offering advance vacation time and disaster vacation time, as well as childcare, help with cleaning up homes and other assistance.
In the days immediately after the flooding, Baton Rouge General Mid City also served as a special shelter for the public, but it has since closed.
—Alexandria Burris
