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NOLA City Officials unveil scheme to “legally” acquire properties from Homeowners

by Leenie Halbert

A recent LA Times article reported on the city’s (and perhaps the state’s) working plan to deploy the concept of “usufruct” to gain control over privately owned properties in the wake of Katrina (originally written by Scott Gold on 10/23/05 and is posted at: LA Times.

Residents and homeowners need to be aware of the implications of this, as it appears the government’s best strategy so far for acquiring large parcels that could be prime land for redevelopment and gentrification schemes.

Essentially, city housing officials are proposing a plan that would persuade owners of “damaged” properties to sign over “controlling rights” of the property to the government (most likely the city of New Orleans, although the money for the program is likely to come from the federal government). The government then would pay to “make the home habitable again,” at which point it would be rented out to “essential workers” for reduced, subsidized rents. Such workers are likely to include police and contractors. Proponents of the plan believe that there are as many as 100,000 homes in NOLA that are damaged sufficiently to be part of this program.

Here is where the scheme gets particularly disturbing. Once property owners have contractually agreed to give up control of the property to the government for some specified time — perhaps three to five years — the owner can only return and regain control over the property if they can repay the government for the repairs made and expenses incurred.

If the owner cannot pay back the government for years of repairs/expenses, or chooses not to return after such a lengthy period of time, the usufruct contract would give the government the right to sell the property and share in the profits from the sale. Land speculators and developers could thus acquire large blocks of land by buying up these properties.

This scheme is a serious inversion of the actual concept of usufruct, which historically gives the public rights of usage over private properties. It has been retained in some European nations to allow, for instance, travelers to camp briefly in a property owner’s yard on the theory that land still belongs to everyone even when an individual secures legal title to it. It is not intended to allow the sort of shift to government and developers’ control that is being contemplated here.

One housing official noted that “the entire redevelopment of New Orleans rests on this issue.” This is understandable since, if the city attempted to acquire properties through eminent domain procedures, they would have to pay compensation to private owners before taking the land. A widespread use of condemnation powers such as eminent domain would set off a political backlash and could be too expensive for the cash strapped Orleans Parish and Louisiana state government.

Under the usufruct scheme, however, the state slowly acquires title to properties with the promise of rebuilding, renovating, and sharing profits with homeowners. When the “repair bill” becomes due in a few years, the thought likely is that most homeowners will either have moved on or will be unable to come up with the money to repay the city, thus wresting title from the owner slowly and subtly over a period of years and not in one fell swoop that is likely to set off major concerns.

The whole key to this scheme is that if the owner enters into the agreement voluntarily, then the contract will hold and the entanglements of eminent domain will be avoided. A housing advisor noted that “in some cases, if owners are uncooperative . . . then perhaps a more forceful implementation of receivership or usufruct can be established. This tool can be used for voluntary agreements with owners or for involuntary control by the city.”

Property owners need to realize the implications of their decisions in the long term as devious plans such as this are unveiled with the promise of short term gains. The future of the city may well indeed depend upon this process.

Leenie Halbert is an activist and resident of the 9th ward in New Orleans. She is an active member of the Green Party of Louisiana, Advocates for Louisiana Public Healthcare, and the New Orleans Food Coop. She can be contacted at (504) 947-8899 or via email at leenie@leenie.com.

Why are They Making New Orleans a Ghost Town?
By Bill Quigley. Bill teaches at Loyola University

New Orleans School of Law, Quigley@loyno.edu.

On Halloween night, New Orleans will be very, very dark. Well over half the homes on the east bank of New Orleans sit vacant because they still do not have electricity. More do not have natural gas or running water. Most stoplights still do not work. Most street lights remain out. Fully armed National Guard troops refuse to allow over ten thousand people to even physically visit their property in the Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood. Despite the fact that people cannot come back, tens of thousands of people face eviction from their homes. A local judge told me that their court expects to process a thousand evictions a day for weeks. Renters still in shelters or temporary homes across the country will never see the court notice taped to the door of their home. Because they will not show up for the eviction hearing that they do not know about, their possessions will be tossed out in the street. In the street their possessions will sit alongside an estimated 3 million truck loads of downed trees, piles of mud, fiberglass insulation, crushed sheetrock, abandoned cars, spoiled mattresses, wet rugs, and horrifyingly smelly refrigerators full of food from August.

There are also New Orleans renters facing evictions from landlords who want to renovate and charge higher rents to the out of town workers who populate the city. Some renters have offered to pay their rent and are still being evicted. Others question why they should have to pay rent for September when they were not allowed to return to New Orleans.

New Orleans, known for its culture and food and music, is now pushing away the very people who created the culture and food and music. Mardi Gras Indians live and paraded in neighborhoods that sit without electricity or water. The back room cooks for many of the most famous restaurants cannot yet return to New Orleans. Musicians remain in exile. Housing is scarce and rents are soaring. Over 245,000 people lost jobs in September. Public education in New Orleans has not restarted. The levees are not even up to their flawed level in August.

Dr. Arjun Sengupta, the United Nations Human Rights Commission Special Reporter on Extreme Poverty, visited New Orleans and Baton Rouge last week. He toured the devastated areas and listened to the evacuees still in shelters and those living out of town with family.

Dr. Sengupta described current conditions as shocking” and “gross violations of human rights.” The devastation itself is shocking, he explained, but even more shocking is that two months have passed and there is little to nothing being done to reconstruct vast areas of New Orleans. “The US is the richest nation in the history of the world. Why cannot it restore electricity and water and help people rebuild their homes and neighborhoods? If the US can rebuild Afghanistan and Iraq, why not New Orleans?”

The longer the poor and working class of New Orleans stay away, the more likely it will be that they never return. That, some say, is exactly what those in power in New Orleans and Louisiana and the US must want. Otherwise, why are they making New Orleans a ghost town?

Hi Everyone -

I know, every time I promise I’ll be back online soon, it doesn’t work out like that. Unfortunately, these days, solving problems with technology is a little more involved than a simple run to the store. I expected to have my internet issues resolved by today, but apparently it’s going to be close to another week before I’ve got a consistent internet connection. Here’s the saga in short: I bought a laptop about a week after Katrina to make getting online easier as I’d been hauling my desktop computer in and out of the van - not exactly practical. CompUSA in Baton Rouge had all of 2 mac laptops left, so I got the last iBook in stock - which would have been fine if there were more wireless connections around. However, it turns out that the only practical solution for internet service in New Orleans is with a cell phone broadband card. So Jeffrey got one of those for me while on a supply run to Baton Rouge. Turns out my laptop doesn’t have the slot for the card, so I figured I’d get an external adapter while up in D.C. this weekend. Well, such a thing doesn’t exist, so I had to buy a whole new laptop (yes, I now have a barely used 14″ iBook for sale - please contact me if interested as I can not afford to have two laptops!) with the proper slot for the broadband card. Figured this was the end of the saga…. not so. Jeffrey was sold the wrong broadband card by the Verizon folks in Baton Rouge - it’s not compatible with a mac. This is despite my having talked to the salesman on the phone while Jeffrey was in the store; we were very clear that this was for a mac. So today I went to a Verizon store on our way out of D.C. and exchanged the card, but of course they don’t have the card I need in stock so it will be 2-3 days before it is shipped to Baton Rouge, at which point I will need to make arrangements to get the card from Baton Rouge to New Orleans.

This is just one example of some of the, um, interesting challenges that arise these days. And hopefully now you all understand why I haven’t been online nearly as much as I’d like to. At the moment I’m borrowing Leenie’s broadband card while we are riding back in the van so I can at least give everyone a brief update. Of course, once I get the proper card, we still have to deal with issues like keeping computer equipment charged up and all that good stuff.

Anyway, enough about technological difficulties.

With Hurricane Rita headed into New Orleans, we decided we wouldn’t be able to do much in the city for a couple of days, and as Leenie and I had been asked to speak at the Green Party rally in D.C. during the big anti-war protests, we hopped in her van at the last moment and drove some 24 hours straight there. In a world that is nothing but surreal nowadays, leaving our occupied, broken home for a fully functioning city extra full of people was yet another measure of the bizarre. We stepped out of the van right into a full 24 hours of meetings and speeches and marches with a bunch of wonderful Green Party folk from D.C. and elsewhere around the country. A big thank you to all our fellow Greens and especially to David and Olivia for letting us stay in their beautiful home and take more than our fair share of non-toxic hot showers. It took 3 showers before dirt stopped rubbing off my skin when I toweled off.

We spoke to people about the real situation in New Orleans and about our needs in regards to rebuilding our communities and our city. We are very excited by everyone’s energy and eagerness to help and look forward to various fundraising efforts and Greens coming down to help, bringing very necessary items like solar panels and other items to help create a sustainable environment.

It was a beautiful thing to see just how people have tied New Orleans in with the global struggle against war, poverty, injustice and the like at the big march this weekend - and very disconcerting. I planned to come to D.C. for the anti-war protests months ago, but never in my life could I have imagined how very personal it would end up being. It’s always been fun being from New Orleans - when you tell someone you are from New Orleans, they usually get an excited look on their face and start talking about all the great things they’ve seen and done there or heard about the city. Now when you say you are from New Orleans, people get a tragic look on their face and barely know what to say. I don’t blame them - I wouldn’t know what to say either - it’s pretty much the same as trying to figure out what to say to someone who has just lost a loved one.

Everywhere in D.C. we saw places collecting money for the Red Cross and so took it upon ourselves to break it to all these well intentioned individuals that sending the Red Cross money is as good as putting a match to it. Just in case you haven’t caught this bit of info yet, here is what the Red Cross is doing in New Orleans: feeding the National Guard and the police and site seeing. We have not seen one Red Cross person doing one thing for any citizen of New Orleans. They do not bring us food or water (the Salvation Army has done this, tho, and we give them many kudos for being the ONLY official disaster relief doing ANYTHING in the city of New Orleans) or medical care or anything. I have only seen two Red Cross vehicles in New Orleans - one perusing our Toxic Art exhibit outside our house (Jeffrey asked them where they’d been all this time and then told them in no uncertain terms to get lost) and one by the levy break in the lower 9th ward taking pictures. That’s it. So please, people, spread the word - DO NOT give the Red Cross your money if you really want to help. They already have millions, and I’m sure that is plenty enough to feed the National Guard.

On top of the lack of services provided by the Red Cross, I’ll tell you about Jeffrey’s latest experience with the Red Cross shelter we were staying outside of in Covington (the one we were buying toiletries and over the counter medications for the residents as the Red Cross does not provide such things) as registered ‘guests.’ We left the shelter to do relief work with the Vets for Peace while waiting to get back into the city. Before we left, we’d signed up for our Red Cross debit cards, the little amount of money they give you to get by on. These cards took over a week to arrive. Jeffrey went back to the shelter to get our card and check on Daniel who was still there and look for our two missing cats that escaped out of the tent and into the woods. Upon driving up to the shelter, he was stopped by a sheriff who informed him that he was not welcome on the property. Apparently someone forgot to inform us when we left that once you leave the shelter you can not return, and that if you set foot on the property you will be arrested. That’s the kind of thanks you get for leaving to help take care of others. And a very nice way to keep people victims - we’d been trying to help some of the shelter residents get back home - they have FEMA checks to go pick up, but no gas money to go get the checks so they can cash them and buy gas to get home. But they aren’t allowed to leave the shelter. It’s a disgusting and abhorent Catch-22 situation designed to keep people victims and prevent them from helping themselves or others.

So now we are on our way back to New Orleans - Jeffrey stayed on through Rita and was apparently spotted on ‘48 Hours’ as ‘the last man standing in the Bywater.’ While parts of the city reflooded, it was in areas still completely abandoned. Other than some wind and rain, the Bywater fared well, as we expected. Our hearts go out to those in other areas who lost their homes and businesses to Rita and we wish you a speedy recovery.

I heard today that NOPD has established its own checkpoints after the National Guard checkpoints into the city - that should add another level of ‘fun’ to getting into the city. I also heard from Jeffrey today that all the French Quarter now has power, along with the Central Business District. We’re glad to hear that the city has its priorities straight - making sure that corporate interests are being well taken care of. Meanwhile, there is still nothing being done in our neighborhood and many others. Leenie cornered a worker for Entergy last week who explained to her that there are currently no plans to restore power to our neighborhood. Get that… NO plans. Nor have we heard anything about if and when residents will be allowed to return to our area, still cordoned off with bales of razor wire. Most of the houses in our neighborhood are pretty much fine… and those that were flooded are in more and more danger of becoming inhabitable as the mold continues to grow, unchecked. If people were allowed back in they could be cleaning their houses up, saving them from the toxic mold - but no, I’m sure the developers and corporate interests have better plans in store for us.

Meanwhile, we are ready to roll back into town and continue our relief efforts. Food Not Bombs will continue feeding people and delivering food and other supplies during its mobile runs around town. We are working on setting up computers and free internet access to help people apply for their FEMA aid and reconnect with friends and loved ones. We hope to be working on setting up solar panels and other sustainable technologies to keep us from being so dependent on hard to come by fuel to run generators to keep a few lights on and keep people in touch with the world. BTW, if you work for FEMA you get free fuel. If you are merely a resident of the city, you get… well, if you can you get to drive somewhere outside the city and pay for fuel and then hope you can get back into the city.

Joe and his friend are on their way back down from Massachusetts with another truckload of supplies - food and water and things to clean with. Joe is one amazing fellow, and a big thanks again to Nicky in MA for helping gather these supplies. Joe and his friend will be staying with us for a week and helping out - we think this week more people will start to return to the neighborhood, permission be damned - and so we will be ready to help them start cleaning up the mess and introduce them to the finer points of existing without power or drinkable/bathable water and with military and police constantly patrolling the streets.

With any luck, I’ll be able to start bringing you all daily updates once that new broadband card arrives and is retrieved from Baton Rouge.

By the way, Algiers, where our city council women - Jackie Clarkson - lives in a gated community, has had power, drinkable water and cable TV for the last week or so. Hey Jackie - what about us? Can we all come live with you?

Oh, one more bit about upcoming plans - in a couple of days Jeffrey will be driving to Dallas to get Sylvester Francis, proprietor of the Backstreet Cultural Museum in the Treme, home of most of New Orleans’ cultural history. Sylvester has been pretty much stranded in a hotel in Dallas and is eager to get back into his home and the museum and establish his presence. We look forward to working with him to try to figure out what to do about all the African American neighborhoods disbanded and dispersed and otherwise wiped completely out of existence, how to bring back the soul of our city.

In case this email is too upbeat, I’ll leave you with some details of my last experience in New Orleans before taking off for D.C. A couple of hours before leaving, our documentary film maker friends were headed into the Lower 9th Ward and so Jeffrey and I decided to go with them. The place we hadn’t dared set foot yet for fear it would finish the job of breaking our hearts - and it did. The outer bands of Rita were starting to roll in, and the big black clouds and falling rain only heightened our already overly busy imaginations unwillingly reliving the unspeakable horrors that happened there.

We rolled into a scene of unimaginable devastation. Thick black caked but now re-liquefying sheets of mud over everything, still over a foot deep in some places. We started over on our side of St. Claude and visited the home and recording studio of my good friend Mike West (mikewest.net). The back door was open and I stepped in to the horrible stench of toxic sludge and spreading mold. Possessions strewn everywhere, nothing where it should be, everything wet, beyond salvation. Even with a bandana over my face, remaining in the house for more than a few minutes was impossible. Ever present in my mind was Mike’s friend Terry and Mike’s three dogs stranded on that roof amidst the rising waters.

From there we passed Fats Domino’s compound on our way to the break in the levy. Another all to present memory, the picture of Fats being air lifted off his roof. Closer and closer in to the levy break the damage got worse and worse. Houses tilted off the ground, houses rotated off their foundations, cars flipped over, mud everywhere and not a living thing in site save one pitifully skinny forgotten dog. Then we rounded the corner and there is sat: a barge. For some reason I hadn’t heard about this barge that came over the wall of the levy, I missed that piece of news. It took me several minutes to comprehend what was sitting there, this huge metal object sitting on what must have been several houses, one end still embedded in a half standing house. And beyond that? The most incredible, horrible, absolute devastation I have ever seen. For a radius of 10-20 blocks, everything was gone. Nothing stood but a few household items that explained that a neighborhood once stood there. To the side, the flattened wall of the levy. I can not imagine this, how fast those flood waters must have come in and with what force to lay waste to everything in its path, nothing and no one stood a chance. Unwillingly, my mind forces itself to imagine being in one of those houses as the water rushed in - but it can only skirt around the very edges of that horror.

So yes, we walked up onto the levy and looked at it and wondered. No, there were no left over sticks of dynamite lying there, no obvious signs. I know there are plenty of people out there questioning our allegations that the levies were dynamited - sorry, no, I can not give you proof - these kind of things are not meant to see the light of day. Still, I stand by what I have heard - reports from a source who I have every reason to believe, and more and more mention of people who lived in the Lower 9th and claim to have heard explosions.

But be that what it may - and we will not stop seeking the truth - the facts do stand that Bush cut the budget to repair the levies and that he said after the fact that no one had anticipated the breaching of the levies, despite warnings to the contrary from before the storm. Or the fact that the levies did not break until after the storm but still the people were not evacuated, nor were they after the waters started to pour in. Whatever the truth of the levies in, it stands as fact that these people were murdered.

Still, New Orleans is New Orleans and you can not kill our soul. While our hearts lie in ruin with our city, we can not help but keep hope alive - this is our city and we will save her. And so, I urge all of my friends out there from our beautiful city to please come back, now. Life there is hard and very surreal, but your city needs you. Please come home and we will help you. Or if you know someone from New Orleans, please tell them to come home. Send them to us or tell us where they are and we will find a way to get them. Our city needs her people and the worst thing you can do is stay away.

Peace and love -

Andrea Garland
GetYourActOn.com

P.S. I forgot to mention our Toxic Art exhibit! Jeffrey and I have a lowbrow art gallery, l’art noir new orleans, that was supposed to have its grand reopening in the downstairs of our new home Halloween weekend. We are pleased to announce that the grand reopening took place sooner than expected, though it happens to be out in the neutral ground (median) outside our house and not inside. ‘Toxic Art: This exhibit will kill you’ held its official opening reception today, Monday September 26th, 2005 at 3pm, in celebration of the 4 week anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. ‘Toxic Art’ is comprised of personal artwork, works of art by others in our personal collection, art supplies and all other items from the first floor of our home that stood in the flood waters for a week and are therefore toxic and must be destroyed. If you are in the city, we invite you to come view the ongoing, ever changing exhibit outside our house at 4108 St. Claude Street (but please, DO NOT touch the art, we aren’t kidding that it can kill you) or you can view photos at http://www.lartnoir.com.

If you have received this message via a third party, please visit http://www.getyouracton.com for additional information, ways to help or donate money (we hope to be setting up Get Your Act On as a non-profit organization this week… to the people out here who seek to discredit us because we are not already a non-profit, um, YOU try taking care of legalities in the midst of a national disaster and see how far you get), photos from New Orleans and mailing list sign up.

Greetings from my balcony overlooking St. Claude Avenue in New Orleans… I’m sorry we’ve been out of touch again for a few days - we are finally getting to the point of working on the technology end of things - at the moment, I’m about ready to throw every piece of equipment I own off the balcony and into the big trash heap in the neutral ground (median strip down the middle of the street for those not familiar with New Orleans!). Luckily, a friend stopped by on his way into the Lower 9th Ward and left me his laptop with cell phone service to use for a little while, and - with any luck - we will be able to get online ourselves tomorrow and bring you a longer update and lots more photos.

Let’s see… I think we’ve been back at home for 4 days now - sans our normal routine and modern day conveniences, keeping track of time is difficult. We are somewhat on the edge of the devestation zone - our house is 6 blocks from the river and the flooding got worse the further you go from the river. While the Central Business District and the French Quarter return to life, our neighborhood (the Bywater) and the neighborhoods around us - the rest of the 9th Ward and the 6th Ward (and many other parts of the city) still lie mostly deserted. Well, perhaps deserted isn’t the best word - military, police, and a bevy of other vehicles zip or prowl up and down the street patrolling or on their way to the Lower 9th Ward across the Industrial Canal. We’ve had lots of freindly chats with the National Guardsmen here - they are great folks - and a few intereactions with the police. NOPD and NYPD are the ones to be wary of, several people around here have been hasseled pretty severly about being in the nieghborhood - but the California police that stopped by last night were very nice.

The first couple of days back we spent hauling muck out of our downstairs and tracking down items that survived the flood waters but landed in strange places. It’s interesting trying to figure out the path of the water and why various objects ended up where they did. We are all wondering why none of us thought to unplug our refridgerators and empty them out before leaving - everyone says ‘well, I expected to be back in a couple of days’ - but considering that regular rainstorms are known to knock out our power here…. we should have known better. We haven’t even dared open our fridge yet, the mini-fridge downstairs, filled with rotting food and several gallons of flood water was bad enough. Mold is setting in fast in this humid climate and the few people back are racing to get the wet things out and spray everything down with bleace - over and over and over. It is obvious now that many houses will have to be destroyed - not so much in our neighborhood, but certainly in the 6th Ward and the rest of the 9th Ward, especially the lower 9th, and other areas close to the lake. The houses, like ours, that were only partially flooded, can be saved - but not if people aren’t let back in to them soon. The longer the wet mess sits there, the worse it gets. Even with our downstairs now cleared out, the mold continues to grow. We pretty much live on the balcony for now - while the upstairs is mostly ok, other than a hole in the roof in one area and otherwise looking like a hurricane swept through just from trying to pack to evacuate - we don’t yet have a cordless drill to remove the rest of the plywood so it’s a bit hot inside. The balcony gets a nice breeze, tho, one end is set up as the kitchen, the middle area is the living room and the other end is technology and compost. The balcony is roughly 20 feet long and 6 feet deep.

At night we watch the strange parade of vehicles that go in and out of the lower 9th Ward or over to the Carnival Cruise Ship docked at the military base, housing police and firemen. That is a strangly lit up floating city at the end of a pitch black street. We aren’t sure what all the vehicles are that go by in the night, but we are pretty positive that the unmarked white vans with the white windows are the body vans. Two nights ago there was a mile long parade of these vans that came out of the lower 9th. Just like bringing back the dead from Iraq, the bodies from the lower 9th are being brought out under the cover of darkness. Ourselves and the military encampment at the high school down the street are most likely the only witnesses to this strange, silent parade.

Other vehicles that go by are police - some to check us out (we liked the car the other night that crept slowly along the other side of the neutral ground until it was behind a tree and then stopped - as if that tree was going to make us unaware of the car’s presence), some going other places. There are military vehicles and then all the cars and trucks, etc., that we can’t identify. We’ve been filming these things with the video camera set on night vision, hoping to get a clearer idea, but the lights on the cars blow out the focus on the camera at night, so it isn’t much help. We think they must have gotten a lot of the bodies out of the lower 9th by now as, especially today, as all sorts of equipment vehicles have been going by and through the checkpoint at the bridge two and a half blocks from our house into the lower 9th. My friend whose computer I am using at the moment is in there now and we are curious, if not somewhat afraid, to hear his stories when he returns in a few hours. By now we’ve become somewhat familiar with the ruins of the city around us, but the lower 9th is a place we are still afraid of, the ‘dead zone,’ the reality of which we are all to aware of yet still unable to fathom seeing with our own eyes. The daily oubursts of tears have calmed down, but many more lie in wait for the day we finally dare cross that bridge.

On a happier note, today some cleaning crews started sweeping our street and clearing some of the worst debris. Other than our pile of wet junk and the pile from the funeral home across the street (ah, irony), the neutral ground looks pretty neat and tidy at the moment and the sidewalks are cleaner than I’ve ever seen them - so long as you ignore the damaged buildings all around and the lack of neighbors. Food Not Bombs is well established at my friend’s house on Desire Street, they’ve been feeding people for two days and will keep doing so as long as needed - these folks absolutely rock and their presence and food is doing the folks that are around a world of good. I’ll be heading back over there this afternoon or first thing tomorrow depending on what kind of time I have left before 6pm curfew after I finish writing this, so tomorrow I’ll update you more on the goings on at the ‘Street Cafe Named Desire.’ At the moment, we are a ’satellite outpost’ of Food Not Bombs, feeding the very few people in our area - today I fed our friend Arthur from the funeral home and 3 Mexican workers who have been cleaning the neutral ground all day, and expect a couple of other folks still in the neighborhood to stop by. We had originally hoped to set up Food Not Bombs and a medical clinic over here, but the potential mold problem downstairs pretty much canned that idea for the time being - and the Desire Street location is much more central. We are working on finding a non-flooded location at this end of the nieghborhood to establish a second kitchen and hopefully a clinic in anticipation of more people coming back home.

Tomorrow I’ll have more about the kinds of supplies needed now and in the near future, our other plans and concerns regarding the rebuilding of New Orleans - it’s still a bit difficult to put all this down in some kind of logical and coherent fashion - life here, now, is very surreal and there are far too many things to process - it will be years before anyone’s head is straight in this town.

Hopefully I’ll get into my email tomorrow - again, apologies for the communication delays and thanks for bearing with us. In the meantime, please pray with us that the storm I just heard is out in the Gulf just disappears - no one around here needs another hurricane about now.

Peace from the 9th ward -

Andrea

Greetings from the Ground Below Zero

My apologies for the long delay in getting new info onto the website and lack of blog/email updates. The communication situation here is still somewhat sketchy - the other day when I finally had some time to get online, we spent all day ‘chasing the internet’ from place to place, only to find out that someone had accidently cut through a fiber optic cable in Covington, knocking out all internet and cell phone communications. Today I finally seem to be having some luck.

Each day is a deluge of information and emotion, so please bear with me once again while I attempt to impart some stories and information while still in a very scattered state of mind.

First of all, I’d like to give a shout out to Joe Capraro of Cape Cod, MA and Nikki from Marshfield, MA (apologies for not knowing her last name) for the fantastic load of supplies they got together and brought down from Massachusetts. Nikki got together all sorts of donations and Joe drove straight from MA down to Covington, LA where our relief efforts are set up, dropped off the truckload and immediately turned around to drive back to MA for work. He will be coming back down in the next week with more supplies and may participate in our neighborhood rebuilding efforts. Joe, you are one incredible guy and I can’t wait to meet you in person (we were out on a supply run when Joe showed up and he had to get back to MA and wasn’t able to wait around until we returned).

And a huge shout out to EVERYONE that has sent supplies, monetary donations, emotional support and love, and those that have helped spread the word about what is going on. While our government has failed us, all of you give us hope and let us know that we are not alone. Bless you all for giving us hope and faith - and please keep it up - this long journey to recovery has barely begun.

Now for the report on what Get Your Act On! has been doing and our immediate and long term plans. As many of you already know, we have decided to return to our home in the Bywater neighborhood of New Orleans and start relief efforts and community rebuilding. It is taking us a day or two longer than hoped for to return, but we are almost through taking care of the things we need to take care of and expect to be back home in 2-3 days at the latest. Tomorrow, a team of helpers from Algiers who have been helping Malik Rahim set up and run his community rebuilding project, will be meeting us at our house in the city in the morning to start cleaning up our flooded out downstairs area so it can be used for relief efforts. At this point we have several people ready to move back into their homes and possibly a number of people from other cities interested in coming down and living in New Orleans for a period of time to assist in rebuilding efforts. Our immediate efforts will be concentrated on setting up a medical clinic with the assistance of the anarchist medics who have set up a very successful clinic in Algiers and a free food kitchen with the help of Food Not Bombs so we can help the few people left in the area and encourage others to return. The first few days/week will be spent laying the ground work for these efforts and scouting out our neighborhood and the 9th ward communities across St. Claude from our house and assessing immediate needs.

One of our new friends, Randall Amster, from Prescott College for the Liberal Arts and the Environment in Arizona intends to bring down a group of students to assist in our community rebuilding efforts. They focus on sustainable, ecologically sound community building and will provide a great asset to our efforts. We are very grateful to have them on board. A few other groups have expressed an interest in coming down to New Orleans and joining us in our rebuilding efforts - they are well aware that what has happened and continues to happen could happen to their communities and cities if we do not make a stand here in New Orleans - and again, we are thankful for and welcome their support.

We also have a couple of fantastic documentary film makers from New York city who were down here last week documenting our efforts and others who have just committed to spending a year with us, documenting the rebuilding process and helping get to the bottom of what has happened. These committed ladies are actually dropping their lives in New York and have rented an apartment in Baton Rouge - but will be spending most of their time in the city with us. We are so very grateful for their commitment - not only does New Orleans’ story need to be told, but they will also provide us with a measure of security, as at the moment, it is far safer to be in the city accompanied by the press. Ladies, you know who you are and we love you.

Now for the down and dirty - and, once again, I apologize - this will be a bit short as I am running out of internet time (curfew coming up).

I have been in to the city 3 times in the last 5 days. Whole neighborhoods are basically fine - minor storm damage with the occasional worse damage, but nothing worse than here in Covington where the power is back on and stores and restaurants are open and life is quickly returning to normal. Yet, the dry neighborhoods in New Orleans (all along the river) are deserted, with no signs of clean up or other work. But when you get into the Central Business District and the French Quarter, there are all sorts of private contractors - mostly sitting around, doing nothing but eating catered food. Blackhawk Security is there, as well as something called ‘Incident Catering.’ Meanwhile, the residents are still refused food or assistance. Once back out of the Quarter, we return to desolate neighborhoods.

We checked out our house - it is fine. The first floor flooded and it’s a bit of a mess, but nothing that a couple of days of clean up and some bleach won’t take care of. Most of the area is like that. But we are not allowed in. National Guard patrols our area - they are very nice, but it is extremely disconcerting to find your home in the middle of a militarized zone. There are army camps all over - at the high schools, at the zoo, at the Walmart. Water was starting to trickle out of the faucet of our friend’s house - that is a good sign. Power is still out, but we are used to that in New Orleans - this isn’t the first hurricane that has hit us. Basically, there is no good reason people can’t be allowed back in. The white suberbs are being cleaned up and people allowed in - so why not the high and dry areas in the city?

Let me tell you - because I’ve heard from friends in the ‘outside world’ that the impression you get from TV is that Canal Street is still under water and dead bodies floating everywhere. Canal Street? It is high and dry - it is media row.

Yes, there are parts of the city that are very damaged - we went into the Treme, the oldest free black neighborhood in the country, where we ran into Chief Al, of the Skull and Bones Gang. I asked him how many people were left in the Treme - he was the last one. Went into the 6th Ward, dry now but flood devastated. This is one of the poorest neighborhoods, but close to the French Quarter - we’ve known for awhile it is slated for gentrification - now, the neighborhood is deserted - no police, no national guard, no people - primed and waiting for the developers to come in and build new houses for the rich white folks and who cares where the people that used to live there are or if they have a place to come back to.

I have to cut this short, sorry, but the bar with the internet has an earlier curfew than the rest of town. Please check out the gallery - lots of photos, no captions yet, but I’ll get to them as soon as I can. I just want to leave you with this - our city, our culture, our heritage, is being killed, stolen. We can not let this happen. So we are going back in and we will take it from there. Please keep checking the website for updates and please keep supporting New Orleans.

Many people have been placed on this list for various reasons - if you do not wish to receive these messages, we apologize - please unsubscribe via the links at the end of this email.

Peace and love -

Andrea

Well, folks…. it’s been a long and interesting day. I apologize - no pictures will be posted tonight.

A whole lot of BS went on today and it’s not worth going into too many details. Suffice to say that Jeffrey and I returned back to the camp in Covington from a supply run to be surrounded by a dozen police officers asking for our ID, all sorts of questions, wanting to search our van… all about this renegade RN that showed up last night offering us lots of medical stuff, long story short we gave him a ride to his van last night and they had to make sure we weren’t in cohots - with someone who it now appears was being pursued on trumped up charges as after all the nonesense they let the dude go. I know, that’s all very incoherent, but that’s the best I can do.

The important news to impart is: WE ARE GOING HOME. Our friend James went into the city today and checked on our neighborhood and reported back that “it is beautiful.” He estimates there are some 30-40 people left in our area. The national guard is patrolling - but - as was stated to us by the national guard we met yesterday in Algiers “well, we’d rather be here than being shot at in Iraq, so our mission here is not to complete our mission (evacuating the city).” So after a long, stressful day with all sorts of craziness with cops and the Red Cross and everything else under the sun, we have decided we are going home. My friend Leenie just got back to LA and she is down with the plan. So… here is the deal: tomorrow, we are are going into the city - first to Algiers to drop off the supplies we picked up for those folks today, and then we will make a run through our neighborhood and check out our house (James did a check from the outside today, other than the awning that now sits in front of our door instead of above it, we are pretty much ok). The day after, we will load up on supplies - replace the generators we have given to others, stock up on food and water, get ourselves hooked up with broadband internet so we can stay in touch with ya’ll… and the day after, we are going back in and we are going to stay.

I don’t have the energy to explain, so I’m just going to tell you all how it is. ‘They’ are trying to take our city from us. Thousands upon thousands of poor, mostly African American citizens of New Orleans were murdered. Those levey breaks? We’ve been told it was dynamite. Don’t ask me for proof yet - just give us some time, we will get it to you. The ones that didn’t die were starved. The rest, ‘evacuated.’ To quote one of our state reps, who now claims the quote was taken out of context, they solved the public housing problem in New Orleans.

Little thing they forgot, though. New Orleans isn’t like any other place in this country. We’ve always (half)jokingly referred to it as the only third world city in the United States. Some of you might be familiar with this nickname: the city that care forgot. Well…. Haliburton has the contract to clean up the city, the developers are salivating at the ‘new’ New Orleans they will build, and the lower ninth and all the dead people in its attics are to be bulldozed so the land can be turned into a barrier reef to protect the city. Ain’t that lovely?

Only one thing - the powers that be are not from New Orleans and they don’t know that this city is born of hardship and survives not despite, but because of it. We have been forced into the outside world these last couple of weeks - and while I want to make it clear that the love and support of the American people has been phenomenal - there is no place like home and we are not going to watch it be taken from us.

So we are going back. We’re going to shove the muck on the first floor as far back as we can and set up a soup kitchen and a distribution center. Daniel is going to set up an animal sanctuary in the back yard. We’ve heard that the National Guard there is friendly, and our friend James will be our liason and run supplies for us. Tomorrow I’ll be figuring out the intricacies of having myself an online connection in the middle of a half destroyed war zone, so don’t worry - we’ll be coming to you live.

We don’t aim to get ourselves killed here - we’ve made this decision based on the experiences of recent expiditions into the city and have determined now that it is possible to do what we set out to do: to go home. But we will have our car ready and waiting… if they force us out at gunpoint, we will leave.

New Orleans can go two ways now - it can stay true to the place that holds our heart or it can become the so called new New Orleans, the brain child of developers with hard ons, government officials happy to be relieved of that pesky impovrished African American ‘criminal element’ and key positions to keep the oil flowing. Or, as we se it, it can become the free republic of New Orleans, the pheonix arising from the flood waters and the flames with spirit boiling over, righting wrongs and shining its light ever so much brightly than ever before.

So please with us luck and keep us in your prayers. We intend to be just fine - and after our experiences in the outside world, we think we’ll feel better and safer back at home in our militarized zone with no running water and no electricity. New Orleans is our home and we are taking it back.

Please keep sending us donations and supplies - we will be turning the first floor of our house into a soup kitchen and distribution area so we can help our friends and neighbors get back on their feet as they start returning to the city, whenever that day may be. In the meantime, we are staking our claim.

I know this may worry a lot of you, but please just wish us well. We are doing what we have to do, this is what we came back for and now the moment has come.

Soon, there will be pictures. Apologies again for the delays, but like I said, it’s been a crazy day.

We are going home, folks, we are going home.

Peace out -

Andrea

Apologies for the lack of communication the past couple of days - we’ve been very busy with hands-on work on the ground here, and also had a few technical issues to sort out with the internet connection. Cell phone coverage is also rather touch and go, so apologies if you’ve had trouble reaching us by phone.

We’ve been in Covington, LA, 24 miles north of New Orleans, for the past 3 days, at the Pine View Middle School. There is a Red Cross Shelter here we have been helping provide with assistance, along with the Vets for Peace. The past few days have been long and emotional. It is good to be back amongst friends - we have met several of our neighbors from the 9th Ward, and made many new friends. The spirit here is amazing - between the many wonderful volunteers arriving daily to help out and the increcibly strong spirit of our fellow evacuees - most of whom have lost far more than we have.

Though some people here have made it in and out of the city, we have determined that it would be next to impossible and possibly quite dangerous to try to enter the city. Not to mention that there are few people left to help now that the entire city is under forced evacuation. The headline of today’s Times-Picayune (New Orleans’ newspaper) screams ‘Leave Now Or Else.’ Apparently a last sweep of voluntary evacuations is being made, after which the remainder of the people left will be forced to leave, possibly at gunpoint. Stories from people evacuated after the storm are mostly horrendous - a woman who walked through chest high waters with her child to the Superdome, only to be subjected to not just one, but two full body searches before being allowed to board the airlift.

The people of New Orleans are being treated as criminals, as if we have done something wrong. A friend saw a 6 year old girl handcuffed for having a bag of diapers in her hand, taken from a store. I refuse to use the word looting for any situation in which people were merely trying to procur the goods needed to survive. A 6 year old girl, handcuffed.

The last few days have found me close to numb - now that we are here and talking to other evacuees, people that survived the storm but still looking for family and friends - so many from the loweer 9th ward and of course you know how great the chances are that they are dead. Still, the spirit of New Orleans prevails - a spirit born of hardship in the first place - and so we continue to go on.

We will get the real stories and pictures to you tomorrow - it’s very late now and we’ve got an early run to do in the morning, so I’m just going to describe a bit more about what we are actually doing at this point and then get some sleep (something we have had very little of lately.)

At the moment, Get Your Act On has taken on the role of ‘tell us what you need and we will get it for you.’ The Red Cross is not allowed to provide anything more than shelter and food, and while the shelter is run by some wonderful people, there are many things the evacuees need that are not being provided. So we have set up a tent where we hand out basic necessities - soap, shampoo, deoderant, aspirin, vitamins, baby food, diapers, toilet paper, toothpaste, tampons, baby bottles…. you get the idea. There are showers set up here, but there was no soap for people to wash. We have made two supply runs in the past two days getting these items and more for the people here - these daily necessities make a huge difference, allowing everyone at least the human dignity of ‘keeping up appearances.’

Tomorrow we will make our first attempt to get into the city - not into New Orleans itself, but into Algiers, a neighborhood on the Westbank, across the Mississippi from New Orleans. A good friend of mine and increcible activist, Malik Rahim, lives there, and is starting a community rebuilding project. Algiers was hit pretty hard, but did not flood like New Orleans. However, they are also not receiving any assistance, and are still without power, running water, or food. The Vets for Peace brought them food and water today. Gaining entrance even to that part of the city is still touch and go, but we will keep trying until we get in, to bring them two generators, chain saws and other tools to begin rebuilding their neighborhood. Until we can gain access to New Orleans itself and return to our home and help the others returning, we will be assisting other nearby communities in their efforts to rebuild, as well as helping fill the needs of the evacuees here and in other shelters and outlying towns. The Vets for Peace and some other groups here (I apologize for spacing their names right now, but will fill you in tomorrow) have been making runs out to outlying towns still without water and food and making supply drops. It appears that we will largely act as a distribution center - the Vets have arranged another spot in town to receive supplies and redistribute them out to places that need them. Longer term plans are being discussed for contiuing relief efforts until and after people are finally allowed to return to New Orleans.

I can barely speak about the horror that New Orleans is these days - dead bodies floating through the streets, buildings on fire, still people stranded and others holding out in areas less damaged. There is much fear as to what the intentions are for the poorer neighborhoods - are there plans to simply bulldoze them to the ground so that a newer, cleaner, disneyfied New Orleans can be established in its place now that poor have been either killed off or forced to leave? Tomorrow I will start transcribing my friend Daniel’s stories and others…. it is simply too much right now, I have almost reached my limit, and I have heard and seen so many things in the last few days it is mostly a big jumble in my head.

Everyone here is so thankful for everyone’s generosity and support - they send you their thanks and their blessings.

Please check back tomorrow for more updates and pictures and more. Now I am going to get some sleep so we can make our run to Algiers in the morning.

Peace and love -

Andrea

Morning everyone -

Get Your Act On! has reached Baton Rouge. On the way in, we were able to pick up our friend Daniel who managed to get a ride out of the city to Gonzales, LA yesterday. 2 dogs, 6 cats and 3 humans in a van already packed to the gills made for an interesting ride….

It appears that the rest of New Orleans is now being evacuated, the National Guard is there in full force, and we have determined that there is no way to enter the city for the time being - and likely not to be anyone left there to take care of if we are able to gain access.

Towns and cities outside of New Orleans are swamped with refugees, so there are no lack of people to help without being able to get into the city. We will be heading to Covington, LA - 24 miles north of New Orleans - to join up with the Vets for Peace who have established a triage center and have been taking care of refugees for almost a week now.

We are all a little shell-shocked at the moment - we had been hoping against all hope our whole way here that we would be able to get into the city, and finding out that there is no access and none of us may be allowed back in for months is hard to bear. We are glad to hear that rescue efforts are finally getting into the city and evacuating the rest of the city - while we have strong feelings about not being allowed back into the city and our homes - at least we know that the people that are stranded and need to get out will be getting out.

Meanwhile, the denial of aid appears to be continuing, though some supplies are getting into the city. Daniel, our friend that just got out of the city, reports that the National Guard troops that arrived in his neighborhood two days ago - the first signs of anyone other than the few residents left, were “good guys” and astounded to find out that the people left there had received no supplies of any kind. One helicopter pilot, upon finding this out, took it upon himself to go get supplies and within an hour had made 3 supply drops to the neighborhood. However, this was the action of an individual, the guard had not been given directions to bring food and water to people, merely to patrol the streets and ‘keep the peace.’

The stories Daniel has to tell are horrific, and we will be relating them over the next few days. He describes living in a complete war zone - the few people left in houses holed up together with guns, fearing for their lives. A big fire broke out in a warehouse on the levy that they thought was going to burn down the entire neighborhood. He talked about the ‘ghosts’ walking down St. Claude - the people who managed to escape from their attics in the flooded out lower 9th ward - people in a state beyond shock. Again, the stories of people calling the one radio station in town from their attics, desparate, saying there was but a foot of space left between the flood waters and the roof and to please come get them before they died - but there was no one to come get them.

So many stories of relief efforts being turned away. Wildlife and Fisheries who had a couple hundred boats going into the lower 9th ward for the first two days, rescuing the people trapped in attics and on roofs - until they were ordered to stop. A group of Virginia State troopers who came down with a truckload of supplies to help NOPD - who were stopped at the perimeter of New Orleans and ordered to go away. A US Naval hospital ship with 400 beds, doctors, helicopters, all sorts of equipment - they were in the gulf when the storm hit and were the first to arrive in the area - they are sitting empty, not allowed to help.

The stories go on and on and on. It is heartbreaking and devestating. The city is now being completely emptied and no one knows when we will be allowed back in. Official relief efforts are disorganized and chaotic as far as dealing with the actual refugees, though it looks like things are getting better set up in Baton Rouge to process people for emergency assistance. Still, I wonder about the poor of New Orleans with a 40% rate of illiteracy, products of bad schools - will they know where to apply for help, how to apply for help? Families have been split up - forced onto busses not knowing where the busses were going, people are everywhere and few know where anyone is.

Grassroots efforts are setting up databases to help people find each other, setting up networks of places around the country willing and able to take people in, matching people up with people who can assist them - they are succeeding where our government has failed miserably. Inevitably, it is taking a little time to get some of these more long term things set up, but these are all in the works and people are working around the clock.

But as far as getting immediate relief to the refugees - the grassroots efforts are already here and working. As I said above, we are headed to Covington later this afternoon and will be working there until we get further word about what is going to happen with New Orleans.

Daniel has been keeping a journal through his experiences in the city and has given me permission to transcribe and post them. We will get to that as soon as possible.

I apologize for the scattered nature of this email - everything is rather chaotic and we are dealing with having to shift the focus of our relief operation from inside New Orleans to the outlying areas, as well as the personal stress of finding out that, while our house is standing and apparently in decent shape, we can not go home, probably for a long long time. While I have spent plenty of time in my life on the road without a physical home, it is quite a different situation when you have a home and can not go back. We miss our city beyond belief. Seeing the signs on the highway for New Orleans and not being able to there - so close, but so far - well, I can’t even describe how we feel right now.

However, we will not be deterred in our mission to help others - there are so many so less fortunate than we are - and helping is the only thing that can keep us alive and sane through these times. Thank you again to everyone who has been helping - sending money, bringing supplies, physically coming to help, setting up interviews so we can get the word out about what is really going on, and just caring about us in general. Please keep it up - as soon as we unload the supplies we brought with us, we will find out what more is needed and send our driver back out for more. And so on and so forth.

Once we reach Covington, phone contact may be difficult - here is something we could use help with - please get in touch with cell phone companies and let them know that mobile cell towers are desparately needed in Covington. However, the Vets for Peace do have a satellite internet connection set up, so as soon as we are organized down there, we will be online and relaying information to you all. As promised, the real life stories will come soon - as well as further information about other ways you can help and what is needed.

Peace from the war zone -

Andrea

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Hello again, friends:

One last update from Austin - people were still showing up with donations all day today, so we didn’t manage to make it out of the city yet. We’ve decided it would be prudent to get a few hours of sleep before driving to Baton Rouge - which means I will try to make this short as we plan on being up by 4am and it is almost midnight now.

Today has been insane, emotional and exhausting, but I am happy to report that the evacuation is not as drastic as it first appeared to be and we are much more positive about our chances of getting into New Orleans.

After I sent out this morning’s update, I received a call from a friend letting me know that he had just spoken to another friend, Mike, who is in the French Quarter - and that no such thing was happening in the French Quarter. So the good news is that these evacuations are not taking place throughout the city of New Orleans. The bad news is that, yet again, it appears that the poorest, mostly African-American neighborhoods are being targeted for this ’special treatment.’

I confirmed reports about the French Quarter myself when I spoke to Mike this evening. The quarter is pretty quiet, and a group of 4 men there are cooking for people at an evacuated hotel. Mike says they work in teams of two - two men stay and cook while the other two run back to Missouri for more supplies. He says this is the first relief in the form of food they have had - from a grassroots operation, of course.

I have received various positive information about getting into the city and so I now think our chances are quite good. New Orleans is under curfew from 7pm to 6am, so we will be staying in Baton Rouge tomorrow evening and then heading into the city first thing Tuesday morning. With any luck we will be able to get to our house and set up base camp there as originally intended. Mike is of the opinion that the forced mandatory evacuation announcements were more of a threat than anything else and that they will not actually try and force everyone to evacuate. Still, that remains to be seen. If we are unable to return to our house, we have several other possible locations to set up a base camp, so one way or another, we will be able to accomplish exactly what we set out to do. Once everything is distributed, we will go back out and get more supplies - and so on and so forth - so please keep spreading the word and sending in donations. The folks we have made contact with in the city are overjoyed to hear that we are coming and so very grateful to hear how generous everyone has been and how much concern there is for their well-being. It is clear by now that most of the relief efforts will come from grassroots based operations such as ours, at least within the city.

Mike would like to note that plenty of white people were encountered ‘looting’ for supplies. He says that many of the police were ignoring this kind of looting. However, we need to spread the word that the mainstream media has very unfairly targeted the African American community with their coverage of the looting.

There are more things to relate, but I am very tired, so I’m just going to give my little list of requests for now and will send out a longer update tomorrow once we reach Baton Rouge.

CAT MEDICINE URGENT REQUEST:

We need some supplies for Mike and Angie’s dehydrated cat, some of which need to be procured through a vet as they require a prescription. For obvious reasons, we can not bring the cat to a vet! So if there is anyone in the Houston area or between Houston and New Orleans that is a vet or knows a vet that can help us procure these supplies, Mike and Angie will be eternally grateful.

Here is what we need for the cat:

Methimazole (the generic version of tapezole); it comes in either 5 mg tablets or syringes (one syringe = 10 doses); if syringes are a problem, the tablets will do.

Lactated Ringers solution (this can be the same as what is used for humans).

The cat is elderly and needs to be constantly hydrated, so we need a decent amount of these supplies, but whatever we can get our hands on would be great. If anyone can help us get these things as we pass through Houston early tomorrow morning (between 8am and 10am), or further down the road towards Baton Rouge, please call me at 254.640.8441 - if I don’t answer, please leave a message and I will get back to you shortly.

PEOPLE MEDICINE URGENT REQUEST:

We have been told there are some elderly people stuck in the city that are in dire need of Insulin and Blood Pressure meds. These also require prescriptions. If there is any way at all that someone can help us procure these items, we would be very grateful. Same goes as for above - call me!

We have monies that were sent to us earmarked for these supplies, so that is not a problem.

SILLY REQUEST:

If anyone can point us in the direction of a store in Houston that might sell a ‘George Bush Punching Bag’ word has it that would be a big hit in the city (when I asked Mike if he had any special requests other than the cat medicines, this is what he asked for). If we can’t get one on the way, please feel free to send one (or several) and any other such frustration relieving devices to us care of Ward Reilly, 645 Kimbo Drive, Baton Rouge, LA 70808. Stress relief is almost as important as food right now!

FREE RENT FOR ONE YEAR FOR 55 PEOPLE OFFERED!

The Vets for Peace just sent us some incredible news - someone in Cleveland , Ohio is offering free rent in Cleveand, for one year, for 55 people! Stay tuned for more details very soon - if you are interested or know someone who is, please email us. I do not know who this certain someone is yet, but send them the most heartfelt thanks.

———-

I will have many more updates and other information about various relief efforts and other useful things tomorrow evening. For now, I would like to leave you with a piece from New Orleans’ Malik Rahim, who we will be teaming up with when we reach New Orleans.

Peace and love -

Andrea

Report from a New Orleans green
by Malik Rahim

(Malik Rahim, a veteran of the Black Panther Party in New Orleans, for decades an organizer of public housing tenants both there and in San Francisco and a recent Green Party candidate for New Orleans City Council, lives in the Algiers neighborhood, the only part of New Orleans that is not flooded. They have no power, but the water is still good and the phones work. Their neighborhood could be sheltering and feeding at least 40,000 refugees, he says, but they are allowed to help no one. What he describes is nothing less than deliberate genocide against Black and poor people. - Ed.)

New Orleans, Sept. 1, 2005 - It’s criminal. From what you’re hearing, the people trapped in New Orleans are nothing but looters. We’re told we should be more “neighborly.” But nobody talked about being neighborly until after the people who could afford to leave left.

If you ain’t got no money in America, you’re on your own. People were told to go to the Superdome, but they have no food, no water there. And before they could get in, people had to stand in line for 4-5 hours in the rain because everybody was being searched one by one at the entrance.

I can understand the chaos that happened after the tsunami, because they had no warning, but here there was plenty of warning. In the three days before the hurricane hit, we knew it was coming and everyone could have been evacuated.

We have Amtrak here that could have carried everybody out of town. There were enough school buses that could have evacuated 20,000 people easily, but they just let them be flooded. My son watched 40 buses go underwater - they just wouldn’t move them, afraid they’d be stolen.

People who could afford to leave were so afraid someone would steal what they own that they just let it all be flooded. They could have let a family
without a vehicle borrow their extra car, but instead they left it behind to be destroyed.

There are gangs of white vigilantes near here riding around in pickup trucks, all of them armed, and any young Black they see who they figure doesn’t belong in their community, they shoot him. I tell them, “Stop! You’re going to start a riot.”

When you see all the poor people with no place to go, feeling alone and helpless and angry, I say this is a consequence of HOPE VI. New Orleans took all the HUD money it could get to tear down public housing, and families and neighbors who’d relied on each other for generations were uprooted and torn apart.

Most of the people who are going through this now had already lost touch with the only community they’d ever known. Their community was torn down and they were scattered. They’d already lost their real homes, the only place where they knew everybody, and now the places they’ve been staying are destroyed.

But nobody cares. They’re just lawless looters … dangerous.

The hurricane hit at the end of the month, the time when poor people are most vulnerable. Food stamps don’t buy enough but for about three weeks of the month, and by the end of the month everyone runs out. Now they have no way to get their food stamps or any money, so they just have to take what they can to survive.

Many people are getting sick and very weak. From the toxic water that people are walking through, little scratches and sores are turning into major wounds.

People whose homes and families were not destroyed went into the city right away with boats to bring the survivors out, but law enforcement told them they weren’t needed. They are willing and able to rescue thousands, but they’re not allowed to.

Every day countless volunteers are trying to help, but they’re turned back. Almost all the rescue that’s been done has been done by volunteers anyway.

My son and his family - his wife and kids, ages 1, 5 and 8 - were flooded out of their home when the levee broke. They had to swim out until they found an abandoned building with two rooms above water level.

There were 21 people in those two rooms for a day and a half. A guy in a boat who just said “I’m going to help regardless” rescued them and took them to Highway I-10 and dropped them there.

They sat on the freeway for about three hours, because someone said they’d be rescued and taken to the Superdome. Finally they just started walking, had to walk six and a half miles.

When they got to the Superdome, my son wasn’t allowed in - I don’t know why - so his wife and kids wouldn’t go in. They kept walking, and they happened to run across a guy with a tow truck that they knew, and he gave them his own personal truck.

When they got here, they had no gas, so I had to punch a hole in my gas tank to give them some gas, and now I’m trapped. I’m getting around by bicycle.

People from Placquemine Parish were rescued on a ferry and dropped off on a dock near here. All day they were sitting on the dock in the hot sun with no food, no water. Many were in a daze; they’ve lost everything.

They were all sitting there surrounded by armed guards. We asked the guards could we bring them water and food. My mother and all the other church ladies were cooking for them, and we have plenty of good water.

But the guards said, “No. If you don’t have enough water and food for everybody, you can’t give anything.” Finally the people were hauled off on
school buses from other parishes.

You know Robert King Wilkerson (the only one of the Angola 3 political prisoners who’s been released). He’s been back in New Orleans working hard, organizing, helping people. Now nobody knows where he is. His house was destroyed. Knowing him, I think he’s out trying to save lives, but I’m worried.

The people who could help are being shipped out. People who want to stay, who have the skills to save lives and rebuild are being forced to go to Houston.

It’s not like New Orleans was caught off guard. This could have been prevented.

There’s military right here in New Orleans, but for three days they weren’t even mobilized. You’d think this was a Third World country.

I’m in the Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans, the only part that isn’t flooded. The water is good. Our parks and schools could easily hold 40,000 people, and they’re not using any of it.

This is criminal. These people are dying for no other reason than the lack of organization.

Everything is needed, but we’re still too disorganized. I’m asking people to go ahead and gather donations and relief supplies but to hold on to them
for a few days until we have a way to put them to good use.

I’m challenging my party, the Green Party, to come down here and help us just as soon as things are a little more organized. The Republicans and Democrats didn’t do anything to prevent this or plan for it and don’t seem to care if everyone dies.

P.S. From Andrea - We will, of course, be sharing donations we have raised with Malik, and though he doesn’t know it yet, I think we have a car for him.

BREAKING NEWS ALERT:

The entire city of New Orleans is under evacuation orders. I just spoke to my friend Daniel in the Bywater (9th ward). He reports that unmarked police vehicles (cadillacs) are driving through the neighborhood with SWAT team police armed with ‘big black machine guns’ telling people through bullhorns they are under orders to evacuate and must leave the city now. People in that neighborhood are being told to go to the big pool on the corner of Lesseps and St. Claude (this is one block from my house) to be airlifted out, tho people are allowed to leave by their own means if they can. He reports helicopters all over the place of all kinds - everything from large Army helicopters with guns to Red Cross helicopters - they are swooping down low in the neighborhood and ‘buzzing’ houses - he said one just flew low enough over him to blow shingles off the roof. He is starting to see National Guardsmen marching through the streets with guns to make sure people obey evacuation orders. He wanted to get into a neighbor’s house to save their dog that is locked up in there, but was told by a National Guardsman that unless he has keys to the house, if he tries to break the door in he will be shot on the spot.

He also reported that Dr. Bob, Bywater artist, was beaten by NOPD who thought he was a looter - they beat him up severely and took his weapons.

We are being forced out of our city, with no word as to if and when we will be allowed to return. We’ve been wondering what they would do after enough people were forced to die of starvation. Population reduction has been accomplished.

Here are the updates I was working on before this latest call from Daniel:

Yesterday I finally spoke with my best friend Daniel who stayed in New Orleans as he finally was able to make a call on his cell phone. He was calling from the upstairs of the house he lives in, sitting on the porch with an AK-47 in his lap. More details on that call to follow.

He just left me a message about 5 minutes ago telling me that there are cops driving around the neighborhood with bullhorns telling everyone that there is a mandatory evacuation and EVERYONE must go. There are helicopters all over the skies. He is not sure if they are just trying to scare people into leaving, or if they are serious, but he has found a ride and they are leaving the city.

We do not yet know how this will affect our plans to return to the city. We will be monitoring the situation as we drive towards New Orleans today and will assess our plans when we arrive in Baton Rouge, our first stop before heading into the city. If we are not able to gain access to the city - which we will still try to do - we will be assisting with relief efforts in Baton Rouge and Covington, where there are hundreds of thousands of refugees from New Orleans in desperate need of assistance.

Some important information:

Thanks to everyone for your generous donations of money and supplies. We wish we had the time to thank each and every one of you individually, but please know that we thank you all from the bottom of our hearts, as do the people of New Orleans. Our government has failed us - or worse - but the people are stepping up. Please keep spreading the word and encouraging others to send donations - our relief efforts will be going on for weeks, if not months, and we will keep getting supplies and getting them to the places needed the most.

You can always donate online via Paypal at http://www.getyouracton.com.

Some people have asked for a physical address to send money to, so here are two places you can do this. Our good friend Ward Reilly, who will act as our Baton Rouge liason and staging ground, can cash checks for us (we will not have access to bank machines in New Orleans to cash checks!). The best and easiest thing to do is send a check or money order made out to Ward Reilly and note on the check that it is for Get Your Act On.

Please send to:

Ward Reilly
645 Kimbo Drive
Baton Rouge, LA 70808

Checks and money orders can also be sent to my sister in Philadelphia - they can cash checks for us and paypal us the money. So you can also send donations to:

Rachel Garland
824 South Fifth Street
Philadelphia, PA 19147

We apologize for not having an official Get Your Act On! bank account set up, but, well, we weren’t exactly able to plan ahead for this. If possible, we will have one sometime next week, but for now, please send snail mail donations to either of the places listed above or online via paypal at our site.

100% of all donations go directly and immediately to relief efforts where they are needed most.

People that are on their way to Louisiana to help or want to come down - right now we do not advise people to try to enter the city of New Orleans until we know better what the situation is, especially with the breaking news about the forced evacuations. However, there are hundreds and thousands of refugees in the areas around New Orleans, and there is a desperate need for help there.

We need to make it very clear that if you want to go to Louisiana to help, you must be prepared for hard and exhausting work. If you are not up to this, you will merely add to the already overwhelming problems. There is plenty of work to be done in other places - helping raise money - put on a fund raiser, hold a vigil or rally in solidarity, spread the word about what is really going on in New Orleans - all these efforts are just as important and crucial to what needs to be done as physically going down to help.

If you are ready and willing to help, here are some places you can go to help:

In Baton Rouge:

Volunteers are asked to go to the LSU P-MAC Assembly Center on the LSU Campus. Very important: they WILL NOT be able to put you up, so it is a good idea to come in a vehicle you can sleep in, or bring a tent and sleeping bag.

In Covington:

People and supplies are needed in Covington at the Pine View Middle School, 28th Street. Please contact Albert Marino at loveisinyourmind@yahoo.com for more details - I have heard that some kind of official permission may now be needed to get into Covington.

In Donaldsonville:

The ‘Dream Center’ Shelter is in desperate need of volunteers. To help them, please contact the Dream Center in Los Angeles at
www.dreamcenter.org or in louisiana call (it’s mostly busy- but keep trying) 225-474-6688.

We will continue to post more locations that need volunteers as we get the information.

NOW FOR SOME UPDATES:

As I mentioned above, my friend Daniel Finnigan who also lives in the Bywater neighborhood, 9th Ward, of New Orleans was finally able to call me yesterday. He and a group of friends have been holed up in the top floor of the building he lives in, guarding the property with guns. As of yesterday, the people he was with had all left - he has his dog and our two cats (we were roommates for many years) and refuses to leave without them - and he has described himself as the now being the New Orleans SPCA so I have a feeling he has adopted a number of abandoned and lost animals in the area. When I asked him what he wanted us to bring him, he asked nothing for himself, but requested cat and dog food. That’s my Daniel You’ll never meet a bigger animal lover.

Daniel says that in 6 days they have not seen or received any help. In 6 days they saw one policeman - flying through the neighborhood in a police car at 40 miles an hour. He reported that for the first two days after the storm, Wildlife and Fisheries were rescuing people from the flooded out lower 9th ward, blocks from my house and his house by boat - and just dropping the people off on the dry side of the levy, with no food or water or anywhere to go. He said that after two days the boats just stopped coming. He had no idea why until I explained the situation with the National Guard to him, and that the rescue boats were told to stand down and stop rescuing people. The people locked down in the city have no idea that supplies are sitting just outside the city and being turned away. The only reason they have food is they managed to gather what they could from friends’ apartments, etc., but again, no one has come to help them or bring them food. Other than the people left stranded in the neighborhood, it has been completely abandoned by all official entities.

Here is a bit of heart breaking news. There is only one radio station people can receive in the city. Daniel said that people trapped in their attics in the lower 9th ward have been calling the station saying where they are and asking that some one come get them. But there is no one to come. Those that are not already dead are dying. Daniel estimates that there are easily some 40-50,000 people dead in their homes in the lower 9th ward. I can not imagine listening to this on the radio, knowing that these peoples pleas are falling on deaf ears. They have simply been left to die.

Daniel affirmed reports of people marching through the streets with guns, taking what they can out of sheer desperation, though he says that situation has largely calmed down. This is why he is sitting on his porch with an AK-47 - he ways if someone asks him for water he will give them water, but if they point a gun at him he will have to shoot them. He does not blame people for these actions - again, they are desperate and abandoned. Now, as with others we have had contact with in New Orleans, the people are afraid to leave their homes because of the National Guard, who have permission to shoot anyone on the spot.

There are many more small details Daniel relayed, but I do not have time for them all now. Just to say that he confirms reports we have received about supplies and relief not getting through. Apparently some assistance is starting to get into the city, but not to the poor neighborhoods.

OK, I have to go now - we need to get on the road towards New Orleans. We will be stopping in Baton Rouge where we will be meeting up with Daniel (they have found a car to get out of the city) and we will then assess the situation and take things from there. It looks more and more like we will not be able to enter the city without the extreme likelihood of being killed in the process. So we will regroup in Baton Rouge and start relief efforts with the refugees already there and the rest of the people being airlifted out of New Orleans. If we deem it at all possible, we will still try to enter the city of New Orleans, but we will not put ourselves in the position of being killed as then we can be of no help to anyone.

All these people will need places to go. Please start finding housing, campsites, etc. in your communities and forward any information to us.

SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT WHAT IS GOING ON.

WHY DID OUR GOVERNMENT DELIBERATELY STARVE THE POOR PEOPLE OF NEW ORLEANS?

WHY ARE THEY FORCING US OUT OF OUR CITY AND DO THEY PLAN ON ‘GIVING IT BACK’?

QUESTIONS NEED TO BE ASKED AND ANSWERS GIVEN. WILL THE REFUGEES BE GIVEN ANY FOOD AND WATER NOW? WHAT ARE THEIR PLANS FOR THE PEOPLE THAT MANAGED TO STAY ALIVE.

NEW ORLEANS HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER BY THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT. BEWARE, THIS MAY COME TO A NEIGHBORHOOD NEAR YOU.

A few more points I’d make to like in the name of the C3 organization in New Orleans:

- no involvement by Halliburton, Kellogg, Brown and Root
or any other contractor for which elected representatives
have a financial interest, such as dirty Dirk Cheney

- full restoration of affordable housing for all residents
of New Orleans as of midnight, August 29, 2005

- complete hearings on all aspects of this disaster,
including sabotage of plans for Category 5 levees,
repair of existing levees, total budgeting for all needed
drainage projects for City being constructed by the
Corps of Engineers

- cease removal of low income residents from any Section 8,
or public housing unit, a full accounting of all residents
displaced from St. Thomas Housing Project and all other
projects

- full investigation of public subsidies for real estate developers
including Press Kabacoff and Canazzaro and how those subsidies
cut into funds not provided for needed social services for the poor,
infirm, elderly, and disadvantaged

- full investigation of the role of the city’s preservationists in the
seizure of properties, arsons, murder, and other crimes

- demand that from the point that the state of emergency
ends in the city, government will be conducted in such
a way that it is transparent and accountable. Hearings on
proposals for how that could be accomplished will be held
and the best ideas passed into law by the City Council…and
if they don’t pass them, those ideas will be the issues for
the coming elections….NO, those elections will NOT be
cancelled…this disaster HAS to on the agenda for change.

Peace out - we must hit the road now and go see what is happening to our city and do our best to help save our people. Please keep sending donations and supplies, everyone has been so generous, but it is still but a drop in the bucket. We will post more info when we arrive in Baton Rouge.

With sorrow and a broken heart -

Andrea Garland