Statement from Church World Service

NEW YORK – As humanitarian agency Church World Service (CWS) disaster response specialists were deployed to Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas this past weekend, CWS Executive Director and CEO Rev. John L. McCullough returned from a tour of post-Katrina Louisiana.

McCullough, an African American, says Church World Service is intent on collaboration with and harnessing the strength of African American churches and policy leaders on behalf of New Orleans' poor blacks, first devastated and now evacuated and scattered around the country.

In Baton Rouge on Wednesday, three days before federal troops entered New Orleans to evacuate desperate survivors, McCullough told a Louisiana interchurch meeting, "This is not a problem about gas and oil, but about humans and human integrity."

"This is an unprecedented situation," says McCullough. "In one week, we are seeing a new version of the Trail of Tears, only this time, due to natural disaster, in which New Orleans's poor survivors – who had little resources to begin with – have finally been rescued but are being transported en masse to temporary shelters in Houston and Dallas, from San Diego to Cape Cod. Others are scattered in homes and temporary shelters elsewhere in Louisiana.

The federal government is transporting 1,000 people to Arizona, while 2,500 refugees are scheduled to be temporarily housed at Camp Edwards on Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod.

"These people's lives are shattered, many have lost family, been separated from family or children during evacuation," says McCullough. Our assignment, he says, "is helping these people rebuild their lives, find new homes, recover from the trauma, and know that they are important, that they are not abandoned.

"They have no idea," says McCullough, "how long it will be before they can return – if ever. The poor of New Orleans," he says, "many of whom simply couldn't afford to evacuate before the hurricane, had little but their families, their city, their roots.

"But we will see them through," he said.

CWS's current national campaign is raising funds for Katrina survivors across the devastated region.

On Thursday, at the invitation of Christian Methodist Episcopal Bishop Thomas Hoyt, McCullough spoke with Rev. H. Leon Williams of CME Reeves Temple. "We have 40 people sheltered at our church," Williams reported. "We're giving them breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They have no money – we're trying to help navigate federal assistance. We know others are doing this too, and we appreciate the prayers and assistance. The churches will need help."

CWS is one of the first agencies called by FEMA in times of national disaster, along with the Red Cross and Salvation Army and, in addition to providing emergency aid and material resources, specializes in helping establish community-based, long-term recovery assistance organizations to serve vulnerable populations.

And CWS's global experience in refugee resettlement and in working with uprooted people in conflict countries will especially be called upon in this U.S. disaster.

With McCullough in Louisiana, Church World Service's Linda Reed Brown, CWS Associate Director for Domestic Emergency Response, says Katrina's aftermath "requires new roles for Church World Service, our disaster response staff, and the interfaith organizations who’ll be serving in this current refugee situation.

"We're essentially responding to three different disasters," says Brown. "Normal hurricane response in the northern parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and other affected states, extreme hurricane disaster along the Gulf Coast shoreline, and the almost unprecedented New Orleans refugee crisis.

"Even in Mississippi and Alabama, where more traditional response work around flooding and wind damage is in order," she notes, "those areas too may be affected by the refugee situation.

"There are a reported 109,000 persons registered at Red Cross shelters in outlying areas of New Orleans. But there are also hundreds of unofficial local shelters across Louisiana alone, including civic buildings and many churches."

"After Katrina, we'll all be looking at long-term recovery in a different way," Brown says.

McCullough, Brown, and CWS Communications Director Ann Walle met in Baton Rouge on Thursday (Sept 1) with Louisiana religious leaders and others. McCullough said, "Cooperation among different faith groups must be an imperative in the response to Hurricane Katrina."

In a meeting convened by the Louisiana Interchurch Council in Baton Rouge, McCullough stressed that cooperation and not competition among faith groups "will help consolidate their role as advocates for survivors who are coping with an unimaginable disaster in destruction and scope.

"This is not just an urban story; it's a rural story," said McCullough during a meeting attended by members and pastors of independent churches in Louisiana and representatives of the Presbyterian Church (USA), United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR), and the Christian Church (Disciples).

Long-term recovery efforts are going to be key in the response, McCullough said after a day that concluded with meetings with disaster survivors in Houma, Louisiana. Houma's civic center is currently serving as shelter for almost 960 refugees. During the CWS visit, Houma was under curfew due to lack of electricity and concerns over the influx of refugees.

McCullough said, "We met one Muslim woman who said, 'I never thought I'd be part of American history.'"

The Church World Service team also met with long-time CWS partner in southern Louisiana Terrebonne Readiness and Assistance Coalition (TRAC).

McCullough says as part of its immediate emergency aid and long-term recovery work in the region, CWS will be working closely with the Louisiana Council of Churches and churches throughout the area.

Effort extends out to Texas
Because of the impact of the throng of evacuees transported to Texas, Brown says CWS's Heriberto Martinez is now in south Texas and will assist Houston Interfaith Ministries in providing relief for survivors now at the Houston Astrodome.

In Louisiana this week, CWS's Lura Cayton is helping the Louisiana Interchurch Council in assessing outlying areas of New Orleans, working with leaders of recovery groups she assisted following hurricanes Isidore and Lili. Cayton will be joined there by additional CWS disaster recovery specialists.

In Mississippi, CWS's Lesli Remaly will be joined by additional CWS team members as well. Remaly will be helping to revive previously established recovery structures along the Gulf Shore and assisting in the coordination of long-term recovery organizations active in other areas of the state.

CWS estimates as many as 20 recovery organizations may be organized and resourced to carry out long-term recovery in Louisiana, Mississippi, northwest Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky.

While formal and informal shelters have been proliferating across the region, indeed, across the country since the New Orleans and Gulf Coast disaster unfolded, CWS's Brown says, "We are concerned about the capacitation of temporary shelters in the region and how long can they or will they operate." Offically, there are no shelters south of Interstate 10, but in actuality communities are full of them. These temporary shelters need help with next steps.

Relief Already Delivered
Responding to immediate emergency needs for Katrina's survivors, Church World Service delivered relief supplies valued at $99,381 to Baton Rouge yesterday (Mon Sept 5), which included 5,000 CWS "Gift of the Heart" Health Kits and 5,000 CWS Blankets.

135 "Gift of the Heart" Health Kits and 100 CWS Blankets were shipped to Houston Interfaith Ministries, an ecumenical alliance of dozens of churches, to assist a United Methodist church in Victoria, Texas, housing 200 displaced persons.

1,500 CWS Blankets were shipped to Terrebonne Readiness and Assistance Coalition (TRAC).

Over the Labor Day weekend, CWS readied a shipment of 20 Interchurch Medical Assistance (IMA) Boxes containing enough essential medicines and antibiotics to serve 20,000 persons for up to three months. Fifteen boxes will go to the Lamar Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales, Louisiana, and five boxes will be used at the Baton Rouge River Center Shelter.

Thousands of people remain stranded in New Orleans without basic necessities and engulfed in chaos due to Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. The human death toll in Louisiana is still uncertain, but officials fear the number could reach several hundred or possibly thousands. Gulf Coast towns such as Biloxi and Gulfport, Mississippi, are in ruins and those in poor, small rural areas are crying out that no one has responded to them.

Church World Service North Carolina Regional Director Joseph Moran says, "When the Mississippi River flooded in the summer of 1993, the people of Bangladesh sent to Church World Service (CWS) in the United States a cargo shipment of burlap bags and tea. The Bangladesh people had seen photos of people in river communities frantically filling burlap bags, and of church volunteers serving them hot drinks and were deeply moved.

"What was remarkable about this," says Moran, "was that two-thirds of the country of Bangladesh lies below sealevel. Their own country gets flooded every year during monsoon season, resulting in the deaths of thousands at a time.

"Something happened this past week," says Moran, "that reminds us that the world is a caring place."

Individuals and groups wanting to help Katrina's survivors are urged to contribute cash rather than material goods.

Contributions to support the efforts of Church World Service may be sent to:

Church World Service
Hurricane Katrina Response -- #6280
P.O. Box 968
Elkhart, IN 46515

CWS also accepts credit card contributions, by calling: (800) 297-1516, ext. 222, or through secure online contribution.