Remembering Those Swept Away -- 7 Years Gone

Yesterday was the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.  The misery and danger brought by Hurricane Isaac took many of us back to the horrifying aftermath of Katrina, the human failure and institutional neglect that resulted in over 50 levee breaks.  Levee breaks, deterioration of the wetlands along the Gulf coast, and the relentless digging of industrial canals all contributed to the storm's awful aftermath -- almost 1,900 dead, another 135 still listed as missing, untold numbers who committed suicide or experienced shortened lifespans because of the poor response and evacuation.

Now the Plaquemines Parish Louisiana communities of Braithwaite and Scarsdale are flooded from inadequate levees, ones maintained by local governments.  There is no unified system of levee standards, construction or maintenance in this country.  The Army Corp of Engineers builds and manages some, states and local governments others. Here is a posting from the advocacy organization,  Levees.org, remembering Katrina, that was posted minutes before they had to evacuate for Hurricane Isaac.

Who Knew? June is Black Music Month! Meet Sister Gertrude Morgan

Sr. Gertrude and Her Artwork

Yes!, according to The Root.  So while I still have time, I will take this opportunity to highlight two women and one book.  The women: Sister Rosetta Tharpe, gospel singer, guitarist (I personally think Elvis, among others, ripped off her style) and Sister Gertrude Morgan, an extremely pious street preacher form New Orleans.  The book: The Fan Who Knew Too Much by Anthony Heilbut.  

Singing isn't exactly how one might describe what she did.  It was more of a chant.   A syncopated, rocking kind of chant. I'm the Bread that raised the dead, I am that bread, I am that bread, I am the bread, I am that bread... Glory! Glory! Holy! I don't listen to much gospel music anymore, too polished, too sanitized, too smug.  But I love this poverty stricken old lady who took in orphans and painted ecstatic pictures. Others loved her too.  Sr. Gertrude made an album in 1970, Let's Make A Record.

Sr. Gertrude sings for everyone

Then Hurricane Katrina came through and folks remembered the lady who tried to save New Orleans soul.  The dj King Britt made a re-mix of Le't Make a Record, taking it on tour to benefit the rebuilding of the city that Sr. Gertrude loved.

Sr. Gertrude's Artwork

It's hurricane season again, and the New Orleans is always on my mind, along with the people who love it and try to save it from perdition, toxic devastation or the mighty winds traveling from the west coast of Africa, gathering their strength, perhaps, from all those lost in the waters in that horrifying trade that brought our people, unwillingly, to these shores.

Plaquemine Parish In Recovery From Katrina

I finally made it to the Oil Disaster Zone, specifically to Plaquemine Parish and the Zion Travelers Cooperative Center.  ZTCC has been doing great work organizing for an effective response to the effects of the BP oil disaster on communities in the path of the oil.

But Plaquemine received the first direct hit from Hurricane Katrina.  When a group of us went to Louisiana in December 2005 to meet activists working on Katrina recovery we went to meet Rev. Tyrone Edwards in Phoenix Louisiana.  As Rev. Edwards noted today, "The place was tore up."  Someone's house was teetering on the edge of the levee.  Houses reduced to piles and the community cemetery had been decimated.  Body bags were strewn about the grounds among broken crypts and toppled headstones.

Today, 90% of Plaquemine residents have returned.  ZTCC has been a leader in helping the African-American community recover.  There are repaired homes, new manufactured housing, a new community center about to open.  And while I think the air might still be a little toxic from the BP disaster (more on this later), it made my heart sing to see such a vigorous recovery. 

Oh, and the last four bodies that had been ripped from their rest were re-interred on the 5th  anniversary.

The Hurricane Katrina Vigil -- 5 Years and Still Waiting Part 1

I like vigils.  It is one of my favorite ways to prepare for a holiday of saint's feast or a friend's birthday.  It can be a contemplative time.  In some African-American churches the faithful get together on the vigil of the New Year (December 31) to pray in the coming year.  And of course we keep vigil at the time of death.

From Salt Spring News, BC 8-29-2010

It's a whole other thing when one is waiting for promises to be fulfilled or injustices to be remedied.  This kind of vigilance can lead to frustration, anger or great community action.  All forms of vigilance accompanies the 5th Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.  The Katrina/Ritaville Express, a former FEMA trailer, will be touring Gulf coast communities to remind the world of what was lost, what was promised and what promises are yet to be fulfilled.  Today they are at the Survivor's Village  in the St. Bernard Community of New Orleans to educate President Obama about what it feels like to wait ... and wait ... and wait. 

This week why don't you join Gulf coast residents and Katrina exiles in their hopeful vigil and righteous struggle for their homes, lives and communities?  I sure will.

Hurricane Katrina Anniversary Article - Carried Away - in Obit Magazine

Sunday is the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina making landfall in the Gulf region.  I was a fledging MFA student, a middle aged colored lady going back to school to focus on the one thing I loved but hadn't been able to give myself over to, my writing.  I had obligations you know.  Community organizing, ill and elderly parents, responsibilities that seemed to require my attention before I could attend to my literary life.

So you can imagine my frustration when Katrina hit, when those images of people on rooftops came streaming through.  I wanted to go there, to help.  School again seemed so meaningless. But I stayed at Sarah Lawrence College and began writing about Hurricane Katrina and the dispossession of my people in general.

The very first thing I wrote at SLC, Carried Away, is featured in today's edition of Obit Magazine.  

My classmates wondered if I wrote about any thing other than death and despair. I laughed.  But you can imagine my pleasure to be associated with Obit Magazine where death is a normal part of life.

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Come back in the next few days as I reflect back on Katrina/Rita and meet folks fighting to protect the environment from extractive industries, climate change and general neglect.

What's Pristine? And an Oil Spill Update

A New York Times news analysis on Tuesday, May 4, sought to put the current Gulf Coast crisis in perspective.  The article reminded readers of  larger and more devastating oil spills.  And that makes a certain kind of sense -- we forget that the largest environmental disasters are caused by war -- but then went on to declare, "The gulf is not a pristine environment and has survived both chronic and acute pollution problems before."  I guess it matters how one defines survival.

Large sections of the gulf region are referred to as cancer alley due to the prevalence of cancers that seem directly attributable to the region's other nickname, chemical alley. Hundreds of thousands of people suffer the multiple effects of poorly regulated air pollution, the occasional refinery accident (explosions, devastating releases of toxins to ground water,  gas flares that fill the sky with flames and toxic smoke) and medical facilities unwilling or unable to address the health effects of these conditions.  And of course a major pollutant of the Gulf Coast in the past five years was Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.  The oil industry failed to acknowledge and largely escaped accountability for the spills that occurred in the wake of these hurricanes. The Institute for Southern Studies points out that in the past 10 years there have been 172 oil spills of more than 2100 gallons. 


And let's not forget all that detritus of human settlement that filled up the marshes and levees in Katrina's  wake: refrigerators, automobiles, roofs from people's houses, photos of loved ones, children's toys.  Oh, and let's not forget what else got washed away -- arguably the 135 persons yet to be accounted for after the storm. 

As for pristine.  This country lost the possibility of pristine when the Europeans arrived.


Oil Spill Update

Folks along the Mississippi Gulf Coast are gathering today to clean the beaches in preparation for the oil eventually reaching their shores.  They will be removing trash and the detritus that washes up from the ocean.  This will make clean up easier, giving the oil fewer surfaces to wash over and cling to.

The last report is that the oil has reached the fragile barrier islands off Louisiana's coast.

The containment structure that is being lowered 5000 feet over the source of the largest of three outflows is a complex and risky engineering proposition.  Oil flowing out of the earth at that depth is much warmer than the ocean water it is being pumped through or into which it is leaking.  This presents the possibility that portions of the containment unit could freeze going down to the leak, that the temperature differential between oil and water in the containment unit could cause a rupture or explosion or that the pressure at 5000 feet will make the whole operation unsuccessful.

Here's the NOAA  Oil Spill Trajectory Map for the next 48 hours:

And this disturbing bit of information from the clean up after the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska: Only 5% of creatures rescued from the spill survived.

So Who's In Control at FEMA?

We are coming into the fourth hurricane season since Hurricane Katrina and the first one of the Obama administration.  I remember the commitment President Obama made to not repeat the mistakes of the previous administration, especially in the area of disaster preparedness and the care for those who have survived natural (and unnatural) disasters.  Then candidate Obama even issued a fact sheet and plan.  You all know I love myself some Pres. Obama but I am deeply frustrated by the actions of FEMA in relationship to the ongoing post Hurricane Katrina housing crisis in the Gulf region.

On Wednesday FEMA announced they were taking all of the trailers back without providing additional housing or addressing the gross and ongoing inadequacies of their response to the needs of Katrina survivors.  

So I wrote our new president.  You should do the same.  I wrote because I am confident he will respond, and because I'm a community organizer.  What can I say? It's automatic.

Here's what I wrote:

Please stop the ongoing stress for Katrina survivors through their displacement from FEMA trailers.  The lack of accountability and control of FEMA is disheartening to those of us who voted for Pres. Obama and unconscionable (that is Bush-like).  

Don't just keep old Bush administration unfulfilled promises, make new ones that meet the needs of a people in desperate straights, and be accountable to the Katrina survivors and their fellow citizens who are concerned about their welfare.

I will be in NOLA next week working at the 7th ward neighborhood house and joining in any protests happening to force our government to speed the recovery of displaced/homeless Katrina survivors rather than continue to hinder it.

Respectfully,

Rebecca Johnson

The Louisville, Kentucky Red Cross and Other Embarrassments

The Red Cross has always been ambivalent about serving people of color, at least that is true historically of African-American communities throughout the 20th century, and with Katrina, into the 21st. The Red Cross was founded in Europe and Clara Barton brought the movement to the United States.
It seems every flood or hurricane brings stories not only of capacity issues but of discriminatory behavior that only serves to increase the suffering of survivors. In the Great Flood of 1927 African-American survivors were expected to sign on to work for planters if they were to receive relief. They were held captive on levee camps with armed guards to prevent them from escaping North. The Red Cross did less for them than enemy combatants during WW I.

The failures of Katrina were more widespread.

Yesterday I received this report, from Louisville, KY, one of the areas Gulf Coast residents had been evacuated to in anticipation of Hurricane Gustav. Evacuees waiting for information about their flights home found themselves listed not by flight, family group or destination, but by animal groups -- cows, coyotes, and of course, the ever popular monkey group.

Evacuees rightly felt this was demeaning and racist treatment. Even more disturbing, after the painful trauma many Katrina survivors suffered when they were separated from their children during the flood or in transport out of the region, the Louisville Red Cross, in arranging flights home, separated children from their families once again!

The American Red Cross is a non-profit but a special one. It received its charter from Congress in 1905 and functions to meet local and national disasters. Since 2005 it has had a couple failures of management, raised and misused cash donations, and, with FEMA, squirreled away donations made to benefit Katrina survivors. It seems problems continue, even as the 2008 hurricane season is requiring evacuation after evacuation.

If you are a Red Cross volunteer, give blood, have taken their CPR or First Aid course, or not, it's time to tell your local chapter that these behaviors must stop. That you are aware of a history that demeans evacuees and donors. Ask your local chapter what they are going to do about this national problem.

This Is A Test

Perhaps you are as overwrought as I, with Hurricane Gustav bearing down on New Orleans just as we are having third anniversary flashbacks of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. I will be writing often over the next few weeks about this pending disaster, the experience of its survivors, including from Memphis where trains have been taking evacuees since Friday.

I had promised myself that I wouldn’t sit home this time; more accurately, I wouldn’t sit at my writing desk, wringing my hands in horror over the treatment of the peoples of the Gulf Coast. Of course, this time it is supposed to be different. No thousands languishing in heat and filth in the SuperDome – it is boarded up and barricaded – no elderly nursing home residents left to drown in piles by the door of their last place of refuge, no ignorant Federal officials, no oblivious President Bush ... I could go on for pages listing the things that aren’t supposed to happen this time.

Hurricane Gustav will be a test of all the government has said it would do to protect Gulf Coast residents threatened by the next big storm. We will be watching to see if state and Federal governments can evacuate a tenth of the people from New Orleans (30,000 needing transportation) in three days that Cuba evacuated (300,000) from its rural western province in less than the same time. To see if houses recently built on 13 foot stilts prove sturdy enough and high enough off the ground to withstand storm surges predicted to be locally 15 feet. But I wonder if the Lower Ninth Ward will be inundated yet again and will anyone advocate rebuilding in such a vulnerable place? And what will evacuees think and feel, reliving such a fresh trauma? Will they want to come back? Or are we about to see a permanent Gulf Coast Diaspora, one mostly poor and primarily people of color?

As the Republicans milk the mounting crisis for all the political gain they can, we must watch and judge how well they pass the real test -- providing protection for those evacuated and a safe return to the home of their choice.