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Evacuees from Hurricane Katrina's devastation find help, warm welcomes in their neighbors
to the north.
By John K. Woodruff, League staff
Arkansas cities and towns are responding to aid Hurricane Katrina evacuees who are coming by the thousands to municipal doorsteps after the Aug. 29 storm devastated their homes, jobs, communities and the lives of friends, loved ones, families. Katrina's now called the costliest hurricane of all time by its demolishing much of the beloved New Orleans, then flooding it and doing the same to other coastal regions of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Estimates about the number of evacuees in Arkansas reached 70,000 on or before Sept. 9. The state had officially registered about 13,000, although some duplication was possible. Experts within two weeks of the hurricane feared the death toll in all affected areas could reach 10,000 to 20,000 and property damage, $100 billion to $200 billion. "It's really frustrating," Camden Assistant Fire Chief Mitchell Barnett said Sept. 2 as he and others loaded boxes crammed with clothing and other goods in a pickup. They'd been collected from Camden residents who dropped them off at the Central Fire Station for distribution to Katrina survivors. "I want to get these things to people who need it now," Barnett said. But diesel fuel at the time was non-existent south of Jackson, Miss., for the fire department's vehicles, he said. Barnett and Fire Capt. Cary Bennett and Noel Steelman were gathering and hauling the goods to a Camden distribution center. Earlier that day, at the Arkadelphia Aquatic Park and Recreation Center where more than 40 evacuees were sheltered, parents were scurrying to get children on the school bus and off to schools that had opened their doors to the evacuees. Melissa Reimann of the Avondale community across the Mississippi River from New Orleans, about 7 a.m. leaned into the school bus doorway and gave another good-bye to her children, Victoria, 3, and Jeremy, 7. It would be three weeks before she would see them again. Reimann, an emergency medical services worker, was due to report back to work at New Orleans. Her husband, Adrian, would watch their son and daughter and try to figure out what to do next. "We don't have a clue," he said when asked about his family's future. Meanwhile, they were staying at the Recreation Center, converted into a Red Cross emergency shelter. They fled on Aug. 28, barely ahead of Katrina's winds and rain that leveled much of New Orleans, caused floodwaters to breach the levee system and flood the bowl shaped, below-sea-level city of historic architecture, great cuisine and home of jazz. "They really appreciate what the state is doing," John Roberts of Sheridan, a Red Cross volunteer who is in charge of the shelter, said of the evacuees. He later put his arm on the shoulder of an evacuee as he attempted to consol her. She later sat and attempted to eat a breakfast of cereal as she watched with tear-reddened eyes her son and a donated large-screen television that showed continuing broadcasts of the Katrina-caused horrors. She was too upset to discuss her plight. The television was one of three donated to the shelter. The large one showed national news and hurricane and flood developments; the other two were for children's games and programs, said Joan Roberts of Sheridan, Red Cross spokeswoman for the shelter and wife of John Roberts. Most families in the shelter were from New Orleans, 367 miles south of El Dorado, and the Jefferson Parish. Roberts had no idea how long the Arkadelphia shelter would operate. About 100 evacuees staying in Arkadelphia motels, private homes, churches and elsewhere around the city gather at the Recreation Center shelter for meals. Volunteers with the Red River Baptist Association's disaster relief group were handling the shelter's day-to-day operations, Jerry Schleiff of the Association, said. He was visiting with evacuees Catherine Johnson of Kenner, La., 20 miles south of New Orleans, and her daughter, Carole, 14. The two were going to leave later in the day, a week after their arrival, for relatives in Nashville, Tenn. "People are great," she said of the shelter. The city of Thornton began a Hurricane Katrina Relief Effort and began collecting donated food, goods and clothing for evacuees on Sept. 1 and by the next morning, Assistant Fire Chief John Scott estimated that almost $1,000 had been collected and boxes of food already had been donated. Mayor Levenis Penix said the money would help evacuees pay for necessary immediate needs and help pay for other relief expenses. "I'm seeing that citizens of this town are highly concerned," Penix said. Thornton was preparing its fire station community room to care for five or six evacuees, hopefully in a single family. The relief fund would provide money, food and clothing for evacuees. The city would seek reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for city expenses to care for the evacuees. FEMA already had turned down the city to help on expenses with an evacuee family of five because the family was able to find temporary shelter in a lakeside tent. Penix said the city was looking to house evacuees perhaps in the old Thornton school, vacated when Thornton consolidated its schools with Bearden. But the school, closed a few years, first would have to be refurbished. Fordyce Mayor William Lyon had another idea for caring for Katrina-damaged cities and caring for stricken residents. He suggested to the Governor's Office that cities and towns in Arkansas "adopt" like-sized cities and towns in the hurricane effected areas. Volunteers, say from Fordyce, a city of about 5,000, would travel to a similar-sized city-after learning of the needs of the affected city-with supplies and tools to help that city back on its feet. "To me, that would be the best way we could help those people," Lyon said. "Fordyce is full of loggers and equipment. We can do a lot." He was meeting Sept. 1 with the Dallas County judge and the county emergency services director about his idea. Meanwhile, the city was helping coordinate evacuees seeking shelter with churches and other resources. Pine Bluff Convention Center was in full use Sept. 1 and scrambling with activity as evacuees poured in for all kinds of help-shelter, housing, jobs, medical assistance and other aid. By Sept. 6, the Center itself housed 400. Others found shelter in private homes and other facilities. At the back of the convention center, a long line of cars, SUVs, vans and trucks on Sept. 2 were bringing donated food, clothing, toys-anything of help for evacuees. Volunteers just inside the door went through the goods, piled on tables and the floor, and sorted them. Mayor Carl Redus, at the center late the night of Sept. 1, and was continuing a few times a day to check on the center's massive undertaking-administered by city and state officials, agencies and scores of volunteers. Forrest City had set up a Hurricane Katrina Relief Effort under the office of Mayor Larry Bryant and administrative services, with, just under those offices, a command center at the Civic Center. A detailed graphic of linked boxes and lines showed who does what in the relief effort. It charted persons in charge and their phone numbers. Boxed revealed divisions of shelter/housing, food service, transportation, communications, education, human services, recreational services, volunteer coordination, finance and others. By Sept. 6, the city had tracked 357 evacuees, including 180 in individual homes, 84 in churches, 70 in St. Francis County Section 8 housing, 33 in Forrest City Housing Authority facilities and 200 in nine motels and hotels. The Cabot City Council allotted $50,000 to assist Hurricane Katrina victims and allow them to live in recreational vehicles and avoid paying water bills for two months. The evacuees must be registered with FEMA to receive assistance. Elsewhere in the state, cities and towns were opening civic and community centers for shelter, meals or both and coordinating relief efforts. From Junction City, which sits on the Arkansas-Louisiana border and was feeding evacuees at its community center, to Springdale in the northwest and Osceola in the northeast, cities, towns and their residents were reaching out to evacuees. On September 3, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff described the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina as "probably the worst catastrophe, or set of catastrophes" in the country's history. He was referring to both the hurricane and the flooding of New Orleans and its environs.
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