Back From Louisiana

18 Months After Katrina, Much Work Remains to be Done
By Bill Quigley

Half the homes in New Orleans still do not have electricity. Eighteen months after Katrina, a third of a million people in the New Orleans metro area have not returned.
FEMA told Congress that 60,000 families in Louisiana still live in 240 square foot trailers - usually at least 3 to a trailer. The Louisiana Hurricane Task Force estimated in December 2006 that there was an "urgent need" for 30,000 affordable rental apartments in New Orleans alone - and another 15,000 around the rest of the state.
. . .
Mental health is worse. A report by the World Health Organization estimates that serious and mild to moderate mental illness doubled in the year after Hurricane Katrina among survivors. Despite a suicide rate triple what it was a year ago, the New York Times reported 10 months after the storm that New Orleans had still lost half of its psychiatrists, social workers, psychologists and other mental health care workers.

More at: the Louisiana Weekly

I, along with the rest of the Hastings Hurricane Relief crew returned to California last night. Check out HHR for stories and pictures from our week in New Orleans - these are our neighbors, our brothers and sisters in humanity and quite frankly they are a reminder that our struggle for liberation is far from over.

A couple of ways you can do your part:

• Donate to Islamic Relief (make sure to specify that you'd like your funds directed towards their Katrina campaign)
• Get involved: Student Hurricane Network
• Help spread the word about the injustices being suffered, the continued pain, the obstacles to recovery - talk about it, write letters to the editor (sad much that the media is more concerned with cracked out celebrities than the fact than this?), blog about it, etc.