Southern Mutual Help Association

Teche Ridge - Southern Mutual Help Association, Inc.s (SMHAs) Teche Ridge is a master-planned $150 million Traditional Neighborhood Design (TND)/Smart Growth development that is strengthening the economy of Iberia Parish, attracting (when fully built) homes, commercial/retail property, civic space and senior living to the community with a conservatively estimated economic impact of nearly three-quarters of a billion dollars. Like other TNDs, Teche Ridge is an environmentally desirable neighborhood as it is a high-density, walkable community that saves agricultural land from sprawl. Unlike other TNDs along the coast that are priced out of reach of many families, SMHAs Teche Ridge is the first not-for-profit owned TND that improves the economy of the area and returns benefit to the commons. Teche Ridge Development provides refuge from floods, being on the "ridge and not in the flood zone.

BUILDING RURAL COMMUNITIES SMHAs Building Rural Communities program includes family and community development activities as well as the West End Revitalization Initiative. SMHA Builds Equitable Institutions, removing the barriers keeping individuals, families and communities from participating as equal and valued participants in critical policy conversations that impact their lives: access to health care, access to education, access to affordable capital. SMHA transforms existing institutions when they dont work for families and communities, and creates institutions when needed where none existed before, building capacity, transferring competencies, and creating linkages. SMHA has founded seven other not-for-profit organizations and institutions, creating more than $500 million in value.SMHA Leverages Private Sector Investment through a partnership philosophy based in learnings about businesses doing better when they work in cooperation with not-for-profit community development corporations. It is not about businesses helping nonprofits do charity work. It is about the synergy achieved when private and not-for-profit partners work together to achieve good for the commons in ways that generate positive returns for both. SMHA seeks solutions that are both profitable and fair allowing for sustained impact in communities and with families.Through the West End Redevelopment Initiative, SMHA and community partners are revitalizing the historically and culturally important, primarily African-American West End community in the City of New Iberia. SMHAs work improving the physical environment (improving the curb appeal of homes and businesses, rehabilitating owner-occupied homes and constructing five brand new homes the first homes developed for homeownership in the West End in several decades) and building community leadership and capacity to make change catalyzed numerous community-led improvement efforts.

RURAL RECOVERY SMHAs Rural Recovery includes man-made disasters due to purposeful disinvestment as well as natural disasters. Rural Recovery of necessity includes investment for development in rural communities, villages, towns and smaller cities. It is essential to invest in innovations, economic development, leadership development, agricultural, housing and necessary infrastructure, as well as attention to the disproportionate impact of climate change has on rural communities of lower wealth and or persons of color.SMHA'S Rural Recovery Response is based in the understanding that Rebuilding Better Than Before after natural/manmade disaster is more than recovering "people and stuff." It includes addressing the flow of water, the treatment of land, where we live and how we build, and must be informed by the experiences of people who lived through and adjusted their lives and livelihoods in the aftermath of disaster. SMHA engages families and communities in their own recovery, ensuring that efforts respect families' deep ties to place and their economy that is inextricably tied to the land and waters.SMHA has supported Rural Recovery after five key disasters: Hurricane Andrew in 1992,Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, the BP Deep Horizon Oil Spill in 2010, flooding in the West End of New Iberia in 2016, and Hurricane Laura and Ida in 2020, connecting thousands of families and small businesses to grants, loans and volunteer labor that help make recovery possible.