USA TODAY reporter Judy Keen reports from Cocodrie, La.:

Cocodrie, La., is at the end of the road - a tiny fishing community where Louisiana 56 dead-ends at the Gulf of Mexico. Out on the water, oil slicks are spotted so often, it's old news around here.

The spill has brought many changes to this town of 300. Shrimp boats are tied up, unused. BP has brought hundreds of workers here to load boom and coordinate some of the activities at the spill site. BP has leased a big marina and rents part of the parking lot at Cocodrie Clubhouse, a restaurant/bar that's part of the Harbor Light Marina.

At lunchtime today, people ate the daily special - red beans and rice with sausage, salad and brownie for $8.54 -and played pool and darts.



The BP workers, wearing badges and radios clipped to their belts, didn't mingle with local residents.

There's no tension, says Jules Ledet, 50, the restaurant owner. Many people here, he says, aren't planning to leave. "We'll be here," he says. "It's a way of life."

Ledet says he's lost about half his business, but he hasn't filed a claim with BP for compensation. People here are hard-working and tough, he says, and accustomed to hard times. Hurricane Katrina didn't do a lot of damage here, but Hurricane Rita slammed the area in September 2005.

Zeke Foret, 63, who is itching to get his shrimp boat, The Cajun Critter, in the water, says he's worried that the spill will change this place forever. "A lot of the younger people are going to have to move and find a new way of life," he says. "It's sad."

His friend Elton LeCompte Sr., 73, has worked on boats and in the oil fields. "It can't be all bad," he says. "You do all you want and have enough for a six-pack on Saturday."

This afternoon we're headed to Galliano and Golden Meadow, La., where local officials and an Indian tribe are working together to prevent oil from infiltrating wetlands.