It's midnight and you're walking down Decatur Street, on the outskirts of New Orleans' French Quarter. To your left is Jackson Square, a park full of lush, flowering trees typical of the city. Across the street, the Moonwalk stretches along the bank of the Mississippi River, now black and vast in the night.
You can see the lights of the famous Caf?© du Monde, where scores of customers still sit at outdoor tables, ordering beignets and coffee. Up ahead, the lively jazz caf?©s of Frenchmen Street await you.
Visiting New Orleans leaves no question: this is one of America's most culturally significant cities. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, its survival depends on the efforts of volunteers from across the country.
Katrina has had profound effects along the Gulf Coast. According to the Louisiana Department of Health, the death toll in Louisiana is around 1400. Eighty percent of New Orleans was flooded by the storm surge following the hurricane and the subsequent breaching of the levees.
The upper and lower 9th ward and St. Bernard Parish, some of the hardest hit areas, were under anywhere from six to 24 feet of water for about two weeks after the storm, and estimates of property damage hover around 75 billion dollars. Katrina has changed the face of New Orleans.
In 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau put the population at 484,674 within the city limits, and in July 2006 it estimated that only 223,000 people had returned.
This spring, a group of Tufts students traveled to New Orleans through the Leonard Carmichael Society. Our group conducted needs assessment interviews for the Red Cross in St. Bernard Parish to help the Greater New Orleans Disaster Recovery Partnership identify the needs of the parish and match individuals and households with caseworkers.
One big problem for residents of St. Bernard Parish is that only one in six had flood insurance because insurance companies had told them they didn't need it. As it turned out, floods from Katrina left all of the 26,900 homes in the parish uninhabitable. Without flood insurance, most people depended on aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to reconstruct their houses. Most of those we interviewed had received aid from FEMA to help them temporarily pay for housing and begin repairs on property, and many were living in trailers loaned by FEMA.
However, the primary source of aid through the federal government is Small Business Administration (SBA) loans, which most people we interviewed were denied because of their poor credit history and low incomes. In addition to FEMA money, most people got a small amount of aid (around $350 per person) from the Red Cross.
Many residents we met have used all the money they received from insurance and government agencies in addition to whatever savings they had before the storm to begin rebuilding. They may have finished gutting (removing the sludge of decayed belongings from their houses), cleaning the mold from their frames and fixing their foundations, but many do not have any more money for repairs. Some families have been camping in trailers on their front lawns for over a year, with no idea of when or how they might be able to move home.
Almost universally, people are waiting on funds from The Road Home, a Louisiana initiative funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that offers victims up to $150,000 compensation in order to get them back into their homes. The program sounds great, but it has been painfully slow. Some people we spoke with who were granted money almost six months ago still haven't received it, and others aren't sure they'll receive any funds. The Road Home represents many victims' only hope for the future, but it has not yet materialized.
One of the questions we asked in our interviews was, "What was the most important thing you lost?" This was always a somewhat uncomfortable question to ask after the interviewee had finished explaining how her house, belongings and way of life had been destroyed. Most people answered with, "Everything." But then they would specify: "my grandfather," "my photographs," "my sense of security," "my cats."
This was the most emotional point in the interviews. We spoke with one elderly woman who had used all her savings and aid to rebuild her home. She proudly showed us each room, even opening her closet to display the new clothes she had bought for herself. For many people, losing everything they owned was like losing a life, and rebuilding represented recovering it. Consistently, the people we interviewed who were living in FEMA trailers identified getting back into their homes as their top priority.
The Bush administration's handling of Katrina has been one of its greatest failures. This disaster has revealed our country's need to bolster and streamline its emergency response systems. The Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for the building and maintaining of New Orleans' levees, but the federal government has refused to be held accountable for the levee breaches.
Inadequate federal assistance in the recovery effort puts the responsibility on us to help our fellow citizens whose plight is increasingly ignored as our memory of Katrina fades away.
Tufts students often focus on issues of international concern, but we should not neglect people and problems in our own country when looking for ways to improve our world. Hurricane Katrina is the largest and costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. Although the storm struck almost two years ago, most victims still have serious needs. The people in St. Bernard Parish were grateful to young people for recognizing their needs and responding.
If you want to get involved with the relief effort, consider volunteering over a break with one of the many aid organizations working in Louisiana and along the Gulf Coast. ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity and local organizations like Common Ground Collective all provide volunteers with opportunities to help in various capacities.
All of these organizations also accept donations on their Web sites. Volunteering in New Orleans is an opportunity to assist fellow Americans in need while contributing to the rebirth of a culturally vibrant city.
Pete Hines is a senior majoring in psychology. Mie Inouye is a senior majoring in international letters and visual studies.
