New Orleanians Rescued by Texans...and Texans Alone?

Parent Cafe
1

<p>On CNN this morning, Jesse Jackson said that Americans have a very high pain threshold when it comes to the pain of African Americans. That is why we can watch pictures of thousands lined up in the rain to get INTO the Superdome and not offer up our planes, buses, hotels and motels.</p>

<p>Even five days later, with pictures of the dead in wheelchairs and tiny babies gasping for fresh air, it seems only Texas is willing to embrace these thousands of poor homeless people?</p>

<p>God bless Texas. They have my greatest admiration. If only American churches and communities would rally nationwide to accept the homeless into their communities-- in the same way that Vietnamese and Laotian refugees were welcomed some years ago. </p>

<p>That would be an American story.</p>

2

<p>Is it that only Texas is willing or that Texas is the closest non-impacted state? I am hearing other cities willing but we’ve got to get the people out of NO first before they can be given the choice of going elsewhere. And I do think it should be a choice, no one who has lived for generations in Louisiana should be forcibly relocated to say Utah or New Hampshire (lovely states but culturally very different from NO).</p>

3

<p>No, not just Texas, although I’m proud of our efforts. Survivors are also scattered over Georgia, Florida, north La., and I’m sure many we just aren’t hearing about. It makes a bigger splash when you can take 25,000 at a time (and lord knows we like big :slight_smile: ), but hundreds of smaller places are doing all they can.</p>

4

<p>Churches, schools colleges are all offering aid, but who do we call, who do we contact</p>

<p>FEMA seems to have no way of getting anything done</p>

<p>Detroit has offered housing- Texas was just convienent and had a big astrodome to put people in for the short term</p>

<p>I am glad Texas is doing what it can, but don’t worry about the rest of the country, we will be there when we have a more effective way of helpig</p>

<p>The President himself said, for the immediate help, give money. We are doing what he asked.</p>

<p>Its up to FEMA and Homeland Security to count the people, connect up familes, get communications open, list the dead, and get transporatation coordinated to those people can be moved soon.</p>

<p>They are rallying believe me
I for one want to see the First Lady, Cheney, where are they</p>

<p>And it won’t be Texas alone, in the immediate area, many states were hit</p>

<p>We barely got them to Texas after 4 days, let see how long it takes FEMA/DHS to take a count of the need and for apartments and housing to be found, schools to be set up</p>

<p>Those kids need books, they need teachers</p>

<p>I want the First Lady to step up and ask for that…wouldn’ that be a cgood thing?</p>

5

<p>Wouldn’t it be wonderful if housing offers were announced in the same way that college places were announced so many days ago? I agree, Utah might not be a long term solution, just as Rutgers might not be a long term Tulanian solution, but these people need some place to go for the next six months…</p>

<p>btw…Texas has agreed to take 100,000. There’s a back story to that, I’m sure–non-withstanding the local love of BIG :).</p>

6

<p>Just wanted to make sure I wasn’t misunderstood, I think what Texas is doing is tremendous. I have been really impressed by the information coming out of the state officials there – regarding health care, education, getting gov’t benefits started again for people, that kind of stuff. I know little about Texas politics, but the leaders sure know how to give the impression that they are in charge and things are going to happen! I loved it when the mayor of Houston just said if you have a convention scheduled in that new building by the Astrodome (I forget its name) for this fall, it is cancelled, we are housing evacuees there. Yeah! That’s assertive leadership.</p>

7

<p><a href=“http://www.hurricanehousing.org%5B/url%5D”>www.hurricanehousing.org</a></p>

8

<p>Alabama announced it’s communities are in the process of adopting hundreds of Mississippians…</p>

<p>Thanks for that link, litho.</p>

9

<p>Some are being evacuated to Ohio per tonight’s news.</p>

10

<p>Cheers, many states have formally made announcements of offers to help - and individuals are offering housing from all over the country. It’s just a matter of geography - Houston is the nearest major metropolitan area to New Orleans (i.e., big city with big resources). It is a city that has the infrastructure and resources to absorb a large number of displaced families, and they can all get there by bus within a reasonable time.</p>

<p>Take a look at the offers of housing on Craigslist - noting the locations represented - before bashing Americans:
<a href=“http://neworleans.craigslist.org/hhh/[/url]”>http://neworleans.craigslist.org/hhh/&lt;/a&gt; </p>

<p>Keep in mind that Craigslist is not well publicized and is not an official relief agency - so those listings are just basically a small sample of the grassroots efforts going on right now. But the people have to get OUT of the city first - and Houston is logically the best choice for a staging area for initial evacuation. Baton Rouge is already overwhelmed.</p>

11

<p>Ya know, Memphis isn’t too far, St Louis isn’t too far, Little Rock isn’t too far, Tulsa isn’t too far, Kansas City isn’t too far. New Orleans is a two hour flight from Chicago, for goodness sake.</p>

<p>Face it. The Texans stepped up to the plate and how. 100,000 poor, homeless African Americans. That is not an easy ask and they got it done before everyone else thought of it.</p>

<p>Ya have to give them credit and… I dunno… maybe a few hundred “Atta boys!! and Atta girls!!!”</p>

12

<p>Cheers - the task right now is to get thousands of people on buses to a safe place where they can get food, clothing, and medical treatment and reconnect with family members or friends from whom they may be separated. It makes a lot of sense to bus them all to one big place to do that job. I don’t think it makes much sense for a bunch of buses to show up at the civic center with various destinations written across the top - if you were separated from your husband and/or kids and didn’t even know if they were alive or dead… would you want to take a chance on guessing whether to choose the Memphis or Little Rock bus? Sounds to me like you have a “plan” to make a very big mess: let’s make things even more random and confuses than they already are. No sense in letting people board whichever bus they can get on first - lets make them all choose their destination right now. </p>

<p>And for what its worth the Governor of Illinois announced two days that Illinois schools would take in all displaced school children for families who wanted to relocate there. But it would be kind of hard for the families to get on the “two hour” flight to Chicago when the airport is shut down. </p>

<p>No one plans to leave the 200,000 families living in the astrodome forever. It’s just a good facility to start and to give these families some time to think about where they want to go next.</p>

13

<p>Right now we have the Astrodome and Houston convention center in Houston, the Alamo Dome in San Antonio, Reunion Arena and Dallas Convention Center in Dallas, and just about everything in between. The Astrodome was at capacity this morning. Dallas is still tucking them in whereever they can. Most of the smaller cities and towns are now on-line with centers. </p>

<p>The next big job, in a few weeks will be permanent housing, and the whole country will be needed. I hope everywhere people will do what a few people in our town have done. One realtor took two of his personal rental properties off the market and donated them, with utilities paid, for 6 months. The motels here are donating rooms and resturants are donating meals. Hopefully, some of these people will end up with better lives after all is said and done.</p>

14

<p>calmom…were you aware that some buses could not leave New Orleans this afternoon because they had no destination to go to? Before the logistics is the matter of simply removing those people from sqaulid, inhumane conditions, be it Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri. Dallas is a good distance from Houston and the Big Easy.</p>

<p>The middle and upper class evacuees are spread out all over the nation and they have been able to slowly piece family whereabouts together.</p>

<p>Not picking a fight here, calmom…just keeping my fingers crossed that other states and communities follow the Texas lead–and giving Texans a shout out in the process.</p>

15

<p>Our First Lady was in the battered area - she was on TV this afternoon - and actually asking the US citizens to help - actually asking people to come - if they can figure out a way to get there - to help - especially for the children.</p>

16

<p>Other states are helping . NYC has sent a contingent of NYPD and FDNY and our local state senator is collecting supplies, he was a Godsend during 9/11. Alabama and MS are pitching in though they too were hit so hard BUT --I have to admit, Those Texans -their hearts are as big as that state of theirs. They are a credit to our nation.</p>

17

<p>A 5 minute Google search found this about Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.kait8.com/Global/story.asp?S=3800473&nav=0jshe5LT[/url]”>http://www.kait8.com/Global/story.asp?S=3800473&nav=0jshe5LT&lt;/a&gt;
<a href=“http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_71853.asp[/url]”>Site Error;
<a href=“http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/home/article/0,1426,MCA_435_4050504,00.html[/url]”>http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/home/article/0,1426,MCA_435_4050504,00.html&lt;/a&gt;
<a href=“http://gov.missouri.gov/press/HurricaneRelief090205.htm[/url]”>http://gov.missouri.gov/press/HurricaneRelief090205.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I just think there’s not been as much press about this, but states in the area are stepping up to help.</p>

18

<p>Yes they are…</p>

19

<p>I did hear that familiar NYPD accent on on TV shot. So reassuring somehow…:)</p>

20

<p>Ahhh-thanks, cheers</p>