JEANERETTE, La. (KLFY) — In Jeanerette, storms that took place early Sunday morning resulted in significant damage to a popular venue.

The Ward 8 Recreation Center had its roof blown off during the storm, also resulting in water damage inside the building.

Brian Napier, Iberia Parish Council District 11, said, “As you can see it’s the retro fit roofing. The integrity of the structure I think is still in good shape, we did have a lot of water. When this was ripped off, we had a lot of water in the center.”

Since no other properties were damaged during the storm, Tammy Trahan, the recreation director for the parish, said it came as a shock when she received calls of the roof falling.

“It was a shock; I knew the weather was bad, but I didn’t think we would get damage like this,” Trahan said.

Trahan said the damages are more than just cosmetic because the rec center is also a major form of revenue for the parish.

“It serves a purpose for the community,” Trahan said. “The children skate, they have birthday parties here, rentals that people plan a year in advance. So, for it to be out of commission actually affects a lot of people.”

Contractors have already been on the scene removing the roof and clearing the building of water damage, and Napier said there is already a plan in place to prevent any bookings at the center from being missed.

“We have bookings ahead of us and we also have an election in 2 weeks, we want to get the building ready for those events,” Napier said. “So, what we’re going to do is get this removed and the contractor is going to put a temporary roof over the exposed flat roof that was there. So, everything we’re doing today and in the next couple of weeks is temporary. I would say by the end of the year we should hopefully have a new roof on there permanently.”

Napier said the plan is for the building to be usable within the next 2 weeks, from there the building will go up for public bid to rebuild the roof.