Gulf Coast clergy, residents decry Barbour's grant process

By SHELIA BYRD
Associated Press Writer

JACKSON, Miss. --Some 200 Gulf Coast residents held a rally at the state Capitol on Tuesday to criticize the governor's Homeowners Assistance Grant Program, saying it had failed to help renters and low- to moderate-income people get back into their homes.
Pastor Anthony Thompson, of Gulfport, said the group wanted to send the message to Gov. Haley Barbour that the grant process was moving too slow and excluding too many people.

"We've asked the governor to meet with us. We sent a letter. He has not responded," Thompson said.

The rally was sponsored by the Amos Network, a coalition of congregations, associations and individuals working to negotiate government and private sector agreements on the post-Hurricane Katrina coast.

The group stood in sweltering heat, holding signs that read: "Affordable housing for all" and "We are not invisible." They sang songs as they marched from Christ Temple Church of Christ Holiness to the nearby Capitol in downtown Jackson.

"People are still living in tents after two years. Most of the people here don't have no place to go. People on the beach got grants," said Pastor J.L. Henry, of Moss Point, referring to the tony homes that are being rebuilt along U.S. 90.

Barbour's grant program is a two-phase project designed to assist residents as they rebuild or renovate property destroyed by Katrina in 2005.

The program is overseen by the Mississippi Development Authority, but is funded through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Community Development Block Grant funds.

The first phase of the program provides up to $150,000 each to homeowners who lived outside the federal flood plain but lost their houses to Katrina's storm surge after the hurricane struck the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, 2005.

The second phase, to cover low-income and working poor homeowners, provides up to $100,000 for people who had storm surge damage to their primary residence regardless of whether they were insured or whether the property was in a flood zone.

Thompson said homeowners who had wind damage do not qualify for the program, and an income cap in the second phase eliminates a large number of renters and working poor.

The group wants Barbour to revamp the second phase of the program to include all homeowners who had wind, water and surge damage. They're also asking for a financial commitment and timetable to restore affordable housing on the coast.

Barbour spokesman Pete Smith issued a statement that said the grant program was approved by federal agencies and is subject to review and audits.

"We continue to believe that the most comprehensive recovery programs ever attempted are working to the benefit of the vast majority of coast residents and communities whose lives were disrupted by Hurricane Katrina," Smith said in the statement.

Marianne Hill, senior economist of the Institutions of Higher Learning, said housing has stalled on the Gulf Coast. She said the number of people employed in construction in June 2007 was no greater than June 2006.

She said people are concerned about the higher insurance costs, new building code requirements and permits.

"We haven't seen the takeoff in residential construction we're waiting for," Hill said.

According to the MDA Web site, grants have been paid to 13,556 of the 15,575 homeowners who were eligible for the program. For the second phase, 2,169 of 7,424 applications had been approved, with 575 grants paid.

Jackie Washington, 53, a Biloxi homeowner, said she's been waiting for more than a year to hear whether she'll receive any funding.

Washington said she didn't qualify for the first phase, but submitted an application for the second phase.

"They don't tell you any information," she said. "They say it's still being processed."

________

The Biloxi Sun Herald originally posted this article on August 21, 2007.

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Bush’s FEMA Again Lifting Wrong Finger for Katrina’s Families

by Ana Maria

With Katrina’s 2nd anniversary a week away and eyes glued to following Hurricane Dean’s path, evidence of post-Katrina stress abounds. From short tempers and increased alcohol and drug usage to low expectations that life can ever return to even the worst of pre-Katrina days to people whispering about various friends and family members in good health but who all of a sudden die without warning. In hushed tones, they share with me their various conclusions on the cause of death.

• Katrina took away their will to live.
• The stress of post-Katrina survival got to them.
• When the insurance companies failed to own up to their financial responsibilities to pay on wind policies, it killed ‘em—they checked out.

Mental illness is double the pre-storm levels, rising numbers suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, and there is a surge in adults who say they're thinking of suicide. . . .

The big surprise: Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which typically goes away in a year for most disaster survivors, has increased: 21% have the symptoms vs. 16% in 2006. Common symptoms include the inability to stop thinking about the hurricane, nightmares and emotional numbness.

Katrina victims struggle mentally
USA Today
8.16.07

The nation’s worst natural disaster is playing havoc with our coping mechanisms, and Bush’s FEMA is playing havoc with how they interpret the rules that should afford some much needed funding for mental health services in the Katrina-ravaged area.

An Associated Press story reported “FEMA has refused to assist the institutions that those people were referred to and it has not explained why."

"A government survey released [August 15, 2007] to USA TODAY shows no improvement in mental health from a year ago."

Katrina victims struggle mentally
USA Today
8.16.07

Maybe that’s because FEMA can’t explain the cruel and compassionless policies flowing out of a “you’re on your own” Bush White House philosophy. What is Bush to do? Admit that he only believes in spending taxpayer money on bloated contracts with his friends? Fat chance. Instead, he and his ilk have surrounded themselves with similar conscious-free types whose mission seems to be to spend the least amount as possible when it comes to helping Americans.

FEMA ran its Project Recovery Program as a referral service only, and chose not to provide funding for mental health professionals to counsel Americans temporarily going through this horrific disaster. Not exactly helpful, particularly when Katrina displaced the area’s mental health professionals—just as it has so many others in the hurricane’s aftermath.

This is crazy—then again, so much that the Bush Administration has done is pure madness. Yes, pure madness. FEMA does fund short-term crisis counseling after disasters. That’s right. FEMA has done so for 25 years.

“The Crisis Counseling Program [has] been supported in the past twenty-five years by the Federal government, provides for short-term interventions with individuals and groups experiencing psychological sequelae from Presidentially-declared disasters.”

Well, if that don’t beat all. Here’s an excerpt from a U.S. Government agency website— Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) provides supplemental funding to States for short-term crisis counseling projects to assist survivors/victims of Presidentially declared major disasters. FEMA supplements, but does not supplant, mental health services traditionally provided by State and local mental health agencies. The Crisis Counseling Assistance and Training Program (commonly referred to as the Crisis Counseling Program) was first authorized by the U.S. Congress under the Disaster Relief Act of 1974 (Public Law 93-288) and later modified by the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act of 1988 (Public Law 100-707). FEMA is responsible for administering the disaster assistance programs of the Stafford Act, including Federal assistance for crisis.

A major disaster, as defined by the Stafford Act, is any natural catastrophe, or regardless of cause, any fire, flood, or explosion, which in the determination of the President causes damage of sufficient severity and magnitude to warrant major disaster assistance to supplement efforts and available resources of States, local government, and disaster relief organizations in alleviating the damage, loss, hardship, or suffering caused by the disaster.

So there we have it. FEMA pays for mental health care crisis counseling, but the Bush Administration is apparently playing politics with the tax dollars that could be and should be helping Katrina’s Americans cope with the myriad of Katrina-related mental health problems.

How cruel. How categorically cruel for the Bush Administration to deny access to federal funding when the money can be used for such a critical service for its people. AND this isn’t exactly breaking new ground as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ website explains that disaster crisis counseling programs are part and parcel of what it provides.

Disaster Crisis Counseling Programs are a departure from traditional mental health practice in many ways. The program is designed to address incident specific stress reactions, rather than ongoing or developmental mental health needs (CMHS, 1994). Programs must be structured and implemented according to Federally established guidelines and for a specific period. Emphasis is on serving individuals, families, and groups of people - all of whom share a devastating event that most likely changed the face of their entire community.

Yet, Bush’s FEMA denies funding for this critical service for Katrina’s Americans. This is yet another example of the Bush Administration’s cruel and compassionless core values. Bush talks compassion and walks cruelty. And the impact of Bush’s FEMA policy is evidenced everywhere.

Whether we are adults or children. Katrina has negatively impacted our collective mental health. In Trauma shapes Katrina's kids, USA Today wrote

New Orleans pediatrician Corey Hebert dreads the rainy weeks when he knows he'll face about 20 sobbing, screaming children in full-blown panic attacks.

"They can't be calmed because they're terrified another hurricane is coming," he says. Parents bring them in because there are no therapists around.

In Mississippi, FEMA is taking away $4.5 million of federal dollars that could be used for counseling any aged survivor trying to cope with what many call post-Katrina syndrome. Again, the U.S. government agency website stated

The Crisis Counseling Program is unique in comparison to the mix of Federal programs made available through a Presidential disaster declaration. It is the one program for which virtually anyone qualifies and where the person affected by disaster does not have to recall numbers, estimate damages, or otherwise justify need. The program provides primary assistance in dealing with the emotional sequelae to disaster.

The only thing we’ll have to watch out for is the Bush Administration demanding that the counseling be laced with religious overtones or allowing the federal dollars to go to unqualified professionals, particularly those who support Bush’s desire to mix his religious beliefs with our very secular government. He’ll have us praying his way.

Believe me, down here everyone is praying. The old saying “pray to God and row to shore” has us asking for help with the rowing part, not the praying part.

Good Lord! If folks want religion and government intertwined, they can move to Iran or Saudi Arabia where government and religion are laced together. Don’t care for that? How’s about Afghanistan where the pathetic fools called the Taliban foist their own ignorant macho cruelty upon its prey all under the veil of “religion.” Don’t like the Middle Eastern example? How’s about reviewing recent history in Ireland with two factions of Christianity did its gut level best to shove its own views on the other in rather violent fashion. A rather bloody mess came about, to say the least.

Religion and government don’t mix well. That’s the reason the founders of our nation placed Freedom OF Religion as part of our Constitution’s First Amendment. Freedom of . . . and its implied Freedom FROM. Remember, the founders were often those who had fled Britain’s King George’s religious tyranny. Talk about history repeating itself!

The point here is two-fold. First, our own federal government already has long established post-disaster crisis counseling programs specifically for Katrina-type scenarios. Secondly, we need to be aware of Bush’s propensity to act in a way that laces religion with government—a deadly combination and fundamentally anti-American.

What is beautifully American, however, is the belief that we can make life better for ourselves, our families, our communities, and for others. As Americans, we hold the belief that a new day brings new possibilities to alleviate for ourselves and the next generation the challenges we face today.

Bush and his White House are fundamentally different human beings than the people I run across throughout the Mississippi Gulf Coast and throughout the Katrina-ravaged region who are needlessly suffering at the Administration’s hands. With the sunny optimistic outlook that pegs us as true blue Americans, folks in Katrina Land are trying to fix the problem at hand that Bush’s FEMA has created through failing to offer to our people the mental health services needed.

However, in typical American fashion, folks around here are trying to ensure that FEMA does not force other Americans to suffer needlessly as it has forced Katrina’s survivors to suffer. Ed LeGrand, executive director of the Mississippi Department of Mental Health, “said he was concerned FEMA's rigid interpretation would affect future disaster recovery programs.”

"I did want to set the stage where if there was a significant disaster elsewhere then maybe the feds would be a little more liberal in how they allow the states use those (mental health) funds in the future."

Throughout the Katrina ravaged Gulf Coast region, folks here fight with the Bush's FEMA and Bush's corporate insurance supporters to get all of them to do right. As they fight, these hard-working Americans who’ve been through hell and back do so not only for themselves and their communities, but also to prevent another town, another family from having to experience this horrific, and unnecessary, hardship.

Lifting a finger to help
While the Bush Administration continues to lift the wrong finger to Katrina’s families, businesses, and communities, the rest of America—that would be you and me—can lift a real finger to provide real help. We can help this situation through letting our fingers do the walking and our mouths do a bit of talking. Yes ma’am and yes sir! You know what that means. It’s political hell raising time! Wooohooo!

FEMA’s Director needs our wise counsel to fund professional counselors in the same way the agency has done after other disasters over the last 25 years. So, let’s give him a piece of our mind and gain a peace of mind for ourselves knowing that today, we helped to make a difference in the Katrina recovery.

Today's political hell raising acivity involves one phone call to FEMA Director Paulison to tell him that FEMA must fund mental health services for the entire Katrina-ravaged region from New Orleans and its surrounding areas across the Mississippi Gulf Coast region and on over to Bayou LeBatre, Alabama.

Lifting our fingers this way can help to outweigh the only finger Bush and his gang seem to lift with any regularity to Americans whether in the Katrina-ravaged region or not. This kind of deliberate, targeted political hell raising is one way to simultaneously lift our own finger to the Bush Administration while helping to create the momentum needed to get the funding we need for mental health services here in Katrina Land. We do this, and things will shift positively for us. On that, I have total faith.

Related articles
Trauma shapes Katrina's kids USA Today 8.16.07
Katrina victims struggle mentally USA Today 8.16.07

Gulf Coast kids of every class affected by Katrina USA Today 8.16.07

Katrina rips up the few roots foster kids had USA Today 8.16.07

Portrait of a Troubled Teen Sun Herald 8.11.07

FEMA takes back $4.5M Mspi wanted for mental health facilities Sun Herald 8.11.07


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Consumer Advocates Help Defeat Allstate's Efforts to Hide its Post-Katrina Pay-Out Procedures

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Aug. 20 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Allstate Insurance Company will not be allowed to hide trial exhibits that include the company's pay-out procedures for Hurricane Katrina claims thanks, in part, to efforts by Public Justice, a national public interest law firm headquartered in Washington DC, and the California-based Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR).

On August 16, United States District Judge Sarah Vance in New Orleans refused to seal the trial exhibits in Weiss v. Allstate, the case of a New Orleans couple who earlier this year won a $2.8 million verdict against Allstate for illegally refusing a hurricane- related claim. In so ruling, the Court noted that "[p]ublic access serves to enhance the transparency and trustworthiness of the judicial process, to curb judicial abuses, and to allow the public to understand the judicial system better."

The documents are available for download at:
http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/insurance/AllstateKatrina/.

"We are thrilled that the Court has rejected Allstate's request to seal these exhibits," said Public Justice Attorney Michael Lucas, lead counsel for FTCR. "This ruling vindicates the public's right to know and it prevents Allstate from hiding its behavior in the wake of Hurricane Katrina."

Several months after the jury verdict in Weiss, the insurance company had asked the court to either return or seal the trial exhibits, which include Allstate's manual for handling claims and an operational guide for subcontractors engaged to work on Katrina-related damage. Representing FTCR, Public Justice opposed Allstate's request on the ground that the trial exhibits provide insight into Allstate's decision-making process and that denying public access to them "would directly impede FCTR's mission of educating the public about insurance practices and abuses." The motion to seal was also opposed by plaintiffs' counsel in the case.

In refusing Allstate's request for secrecy, the Court specifically rejected Allstate's argument that public access to the trial exhibits would cause it prejudice in other litigation involving hurricane-Katrina claims, holding that "[w]hen, as here, the documents are in the possession of the court as trial exhibits, the case is even stronger for permitting other litigants to have access to them." The Court further ruled that Allstate had failed to identify any specific reason why disclosure of the materials "might be harmful to Allstate's competitive position."

"Allstate clearly did not want to disclose the internal proce-dures by which it handled the claims of Katrina survivors, but the public and policymakers have a right to know why and how insurance companies make decisions to pay or not to pay in the wake of disasters," said FTCR' Executive Director Doug Heller. "This ruling will prevent Allstate from using the court system as a cloak of secrecy."

Public Justice Staff Attorney Leslie Brueckner and cooperating counsel Brian D. Katz, Stephen J. Herman, Joseph E. Cain, and Soren E. Gisleson of Herman Herman Katz & Cotlar, LLP in New Orleans are also representing FTCR.

Read the court order and briefs for Weiss v. Allstate at
http://www.publicjustice.net/briefs_documents.htm.

SOURCE: Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights

Related sources:

http://www.consumerwatchdog.org

http://www.publicjustice.net

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“Run for Cover!” Republican Gov. Evacuation Plan for Gulf Coast Residents

by Ana Maria



With Hurricane Dean tearing through the Caribbean, Gulf Coast residents watch the weather reports praying that whatever Mother Nature does, she does elsewhere. We’re still a long way off from recovering from Hurricane Katrina, which demolished the area two years ago. Many of our families—mine, included—have put into place evacuation plans that we had never before felt a need to have BK, Before Katrina.

The Associated Press reported that Mississippi’s Republican Governor Haley Barbour stated

“people should think about where they will go if an evacuation is ordered and how they'll travel.”

Oh, so that’s it? What is this?! Barbour’s admission that he has no evacuation plan?

Maybe Barbour is taking a page out of Karl Rove’s scare-‘em-half-to-death political playbook. After all, it is an election year for the governor’s mansion here in Mississippi.

Instead of real, effective, and efficient homeland security, however, Barbour decided to squander public dollars on little more than election-year posturing. Mississippi’s Republican Governor sent out a pre-recorded message to

“some 70,000 land-based phone lines in the three southernmost Coast counties Saturday morning. The message reminded locals a hurricane was in the Caribbean, and now is the time to pay attention to weather reports and have a hurricane evacuation route in mind, as well as to load up on supplies.”

Like we don’t know that. We’ve been through a few hurricanes in our day, and believe me, we’re watching the weather closely.
Click here to listen to Barbour's call to Gulf Coast residents telling us "not to panic." [Call courtesy of John Leek.]

Rather than election year posturing using fear that Karl Rove tells Republicans to instill in voters, how’s about something more important and effective for the situation at hand. Like what, you ask? Well, you know, homeland security kinds of things. The real kind, that is.

What A Homeland Security Plan Could Include
If the governor were so inclined—and apparently Barbour is not, he could have set up emergency hurricane evacuation hot lines staffed with calm, cool, collected, and well-trained individuals from right here in South Mississippi, good folks who provide information fellow South Mississippians need to keep us safe during the stormy hurricane season. These hotlines could provide a much-needed service to the Gulf Coast’s residents and business owners.

In addition, staffing these hotlines with local people provides much-needed revenue into the coffers of Katrina’s families who could use the income. Nothing like a good paying job to help buoy a person out of feeling totally depressed or a family out of its financial crisis, both of which are major problems throughout the region. The only people getting wealthy off of recovery efforts seem to be those with close ties to the White House or to Barbour himself.

To help keep our families safe and secure, hotline operators could provide important critical pieces of information. For example, operators could provide a list of items (children’s birth certificates, social security cards, driver’s license, medicines, doctors’ names, etc.) that everyone should have with them regardless of whether they go to a local safe haven or evacuate outside of the area.

For those who are need a local safe haven for shelter, hotline operators could be armed with the following critical pieces of information.

The closest places we can go for safety complete with addresses and directions on how to get there. This would require that the governor’s homeland security people would have scoured the area to locate and negotiate the use of the facility for this extremely important emergency usage.

Phone numbers to call to obtain a ride to the nearby safe havens that our responsible government has secured. This would require more organizing and negotiating with folks on the ground as well as finding out an approximate number of people that would request this important evacuation assistance.

A list of things that should be brought to the safe havens: (i.e. bedding and the like). Depending on where folks are going to ride out a storm, different items would be required and prohibited. We will need to know which is which. Through his emergency management people, the governor should ensure that this kind of information is available to us.

Barbour’s administration could send out tape-recorded messages to the homes with phone service informing South Mississippians of these hot lines staffed with wonderful homegrown folks providing this much needed service.

There may be plenty of Mississippians who are in a similar position as Keisha, the young single mother with two children and no car with which to evacuate on her own. Katrina ruined Keisha’s car, and she has not been able to replace it.

When she was talking with Democratic Gubernatorial nominee John Eaves the other day, I heard her tell Eaves that FEMA gave her $3,000 for all of her belongings, those of her two young children, and her car. Goodness knows that even if she had forgone replacing any clothes, bedding, toys, or books for her children, $3,000 would not have purchased a safe and reliable vehicle for her and her children. My heart went out to her as she was talking with Eaves and WLOX-TV 13, an ABC affiliate located in Biloxi, Miss.

The governor’s evacuation plan would also need to address how to keep safe those who are too sick to move, the disabled, and the elderly. These Mississippians need safety, too.

It’s been two years since Katrina. Plenty of billions of dollars have made their way from Washington, DC, to Jackson, Miss. With Hurricane Dean blowing its way through the ocean waters, none of us need more hot air from some high-ranking Republican government official.

Where are Mississippi’s coastal evacuation plans? Surely someone somewhere got federal money to create them. So where are they?

Rather than describing a well-though out deliberate plan of action to protect the Gulf Coast and its residents, Barbour announced “No government is big enough to do everything for everybody.”

What a cop out. No one is asking our government to do everything for everybody. We do ask it to do some things for some people. And those “some people” includes regular families with regular lives. No matter how minimalist some one thinks that they want our government to be, when it comes to homeland security, we expect America’s public officials to act like we’re the number one nation on the planet.

Apparently, Barbour hasn’t figured out that homeland security requires more than screaming “Run for cover!”


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Portrait of a troubled teen

Depression after Katrina led to book about recovery
By MEAGHAN CHAPMAN
mchapman@sunherald.com

DREW TARTER/SUN HERALD

Haley Moon, a Biloxi native and recent graduate of St. John High School, has written a book about her Katrina experiences.

BILOXI -Former homecoming queen and aspiring dancer Haley Moon may not look like the portrait of a troubled teenager, but things aren't always what they seem.

The 18-year-old St. John graduate has used her post-Hurricane Katrina experience to come to terms with a near eating disorder and a severe bout of depression to write a self-published book, "Katrina Tears," and she wants teenagers to know even the darkest of times can't take away their dreams.

Moon's struggle began after Katrina when she returned to her Holly Hills subdivision home in Biloxi to find her life in shambles, her home soaked in 5 feet of flood water, her belongings washed away, and the beloved dance studio, where she spent countless hours perfecting her dance moves, damaged and closed.

It "was one of the worst shocks... I was just crushed, I didn't think I would be able to dance again," she said.

Then the panic attacks began.

On some nights, Moon said, she stayed up and cried until 3 a.m., at her lowest point having suicidal thoughts, and wondering what was wrong with her.

She sought help from a psychologist and learned she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.

"I was so burnt out on trying to be perfect," she said. "I just wanted to be me."

Meanwhile, an English assignment in which seniors were urged to push themselves into fulfilling a personal-growth experience led some students to choose to attain scuba-diving certification or a pilot's license. Moon used a notebook filled with her thoughts during her loneliest moments to write "Katrina Tears."

She said she believes it is important that other teenagers going through difficult times know they are not alone, although they may feel isolated.

Moon worked with medical professionals to gather information on post-Katrina stress and coping strategies to include in her book. One of her advisers was Dr. William Gasparrini, clinical psychologist of the Applied Psychology Center.

"A lot of the ideas (in the book) involve seeking help when it's needed and talking about feelings," said Gasparrini, "and those are always good ideas."

Moon's book is selling well locally, having made the Top 10 Local Bestsellers list last week at Barnes & Noble in the CrossRoads Shopping Center in Gulfport, and she is currently seeking grants to publish more books to distribute to states affected by Hurricane Katrina.

Now she is on her way to fulfilling her lifelong dream of dancing on Broadway. She is headed to New York this fall to attend Barnard College on a full scholarship, and she hopes to major in dance and biochemistry.

"I'm so strong now, and I have such a sense of self," she said. "I feel prepared for almost anything."

---

Highlights from 'Katrina Tears' Post traumatic stress disorder is an anxiety disorder in which an adolescent has been exposed to a traumatic event. A traumatic event is an experience that is emotionally painful, shocking or distressing, where the adolescent's response involved intense fear, horror or helplessness. Examples of traumatic events among adolescents:
• Natural disasters

• Date rape

• Terrorism

• Child abuse

• Death of loved one

PTSD symptoms may include:

• Poor concentration

• Sleep disturbances, nightmares

• Difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep

• Irritability

• Little interest in usual activities

• Thoughts of having a short future

• Headaches

• Stomachaches

• Dizziness

Treatment of PTSD: Cognitive behavioral therapy

The adolescent is taught ways to overcome depression or anxiety and cope with reminders of his or her traumatic events.

"I was so burnt out on trying to be perfect.

I just wanted to be me."
- Haley Moon

Sun Herald originally published this article on August 11, 2007.

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FEMA takes back $4.5M Mspi wanted for mental health facilities

Posted on Sat, Aug. 11, 2007
The Associated Press

GULFPORT, Miss. -- The government has taken back $4.5 million in funding left over from an expired counseling program even though Mississippi coast officials sought the funds for local public mental health facilities.

FEMA spokesman Eugene Brezany said government officials interpret a rule in the Stafford Act, which governs FEMA's response to disasters, as meaning that they will not provide or assist with mental health treatment in any way for disaster victims.

Some Mississippi health officials said FEMA had devised a post-disaster response to mental health issues that is less than satisfactory. They said while it reaches out to disaster victims, FEMA does not provide any real help because its refusal to provide treatment.

The government's Project Recovery program operated mainly as a referral service which connected almost 400,000 people with doctors and facilities where they could get help. FEMA has refused to assist the institutions that those people were referred to and it has not explained why.

Ed LeGrand, executive director of the Mississippi Department of Mental Health, which administered Project Recovery and led the effort to keep the leftover $4.5 million in the state, said FEMA's initial response was more like emergency outreach work than actual counseling.

The need, however, for emergency outreach work ran out earlier this year, LeGrand said, so they did not spend the more than $19 million allocated for it in the hope that the funds could be used by MDMH in a way that would have a better impact.

"We could've gone ahead and extended Project Recovery," LeGrand said. "I wanted it to be redirected where it would have a very purposeful and productive use."

Jeff Bennett, director of the Gulf Coast Mental Health Center, a public treatment facility covering all of Harrison and Hancock counties, said he has struggled with a lack of adequate funding to keep staff and provide assistance to the uninsured and underinsured as people with Katrina-related issues continue to flood his office. Many of those people were referred to him by Project Recovery workers, he said.

Kris Jones, director of disaster preparedness and recovery for MDMH, said Project Recovery was a system largely based on a post-Sept. 11 model.

However, unlike Hurricane Katrina, Sept. 11 did not decimate the local mental health system, Jones said, and at the time they were even able to get away with providing cognitive behavioral therapy to victims, unlike the post-Katrina Gulf Coast.

LeGrand said he was concerned FEMA's rigid interpretation would affect future disaster recovery programs

"I did want to set the stage where if there was a significant disaster elsewhere then maybe the feds would be a little more liberal in how they allow the states use those (mental health) funds in the future," LeGrand said.

---

© 2007 Sun Herald. All Rights Reserved.

http://www.sunherald.com
Sun Herald published original article on August 11, 2007.

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The Best of A.M. in the Morning! August 13-17

by Ana Maria

Katrina-Land: A Lesson in Crossing the Political Divide 8.13.07
Katrina Town Hall Reflected Selflessness of Gulf Coast 8.14.07
FEMA, how would you like your eggs? 8.15.07
Young Mother in FEMA Trailer Yearns for Home 8.16.07
Growing Up After Camille, Reflections on Katrina 8.17.07


Broadening Katrina’s Lens: A Five-Part Series
Part 1: Broadening Katrina's Lens
Part 2: Recovery’s Two Major Impediments: $$$ and the "F" word
Part 3: The "F" Word: FEMA
Part 4: Katrina’s Bigger Picture
Part 5: Katrina’s Karmic Payback: Insurance Reform

Growing Up After Camille, Reflections on Katrina
8.17.07

Thirty-eight years ago today Hurricane Camille hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. I was but a child of ten. Our family home had been built on the highest land in Hancock County. We slept in the hall. One of the families in the neighborhood stayed with us bringing their grandkids with them. Great! More people to play with my younger brother and me.

I remember the eye of Hurricane Camille when the storm got deadly silent, truly the calm before the hurricane kicked up all over again but from the opposite direction. Someone opened the door and one of my older brothers had a rope around his waist as he ventured outside to check on the family dog in the shed. Peering out the door, all I could see were trees that Camille had knocked down making the outside appear as though we were inside Sherwood Forest. Read More......

Young Mother in FEMA Trailer Yearns for Home
8.16.07

Through stinging, burning eyes I listened as WLOX-TV 13 filmed a conversation between a young single mother of two living in a FEMA trailer and John Eaves, Mississippi’s Democratic Gubernatorial Nominee. Rare is the interview with FEMA residents. Read More . . . .


FEMA, how would you like your eggs?
8.15.07

Clearly the first meaning for the initials A.M. in my blog’s name, A.M. in the meaning is my own name—Ana Maria. However, the other meaning of AM is Adult Maturity.

"What being an adult means is knowing what you have to do and doing it, even though you may not feel like doing it."

Robert T. Kiyosaki
Rich Dad’s Cashflow Quadrant

Since publishing my first blog entry on May 1st of this year—Like Walking Through Glue—I have learned that Katrina was a great equalizer bringing out the real character in plenty of folks, bringing out shared core values, and waking up people—myself included—in new ways. Read More . . . .

Katrina Town Hall Reflected Selflessness of Gulf Coast
8.14.07

With standing room only in the large parish hall on top of a massive bluff overlooking the Bay which feeds into the Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Coast Congressman Gene Taylor (D-MS) hosted the second town hall meeting with a delegation of plenty of congressional leadership from across the country.

From as far west as California to the northeast of New Hampshire, Democratic Congressional representatives gave up time with their families and their constituents to revisit the Katrina-ravaged area. We were honored to have the high-ranking leadership of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Democratic Majority Whip Jim Clyburn from South Carolina. Read More . . . .


Katrina-Land: A Lesson in Crossing the Political Divide
8.13.07

Today is the day I’ve been looking forward to for quite sometime. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) leads a delegation to New Orleans and over to the Mississippi Gulf Coast to see the state of post-Katrina living. Last year I was living in San Jose, Calif., which is about an hour’s south of San Francisco—the district that Pelosi represents. I wasn’t here for Katrina, though plenty of my family members were. I remember when I read that Pelosi had led a delegation of Democrats to this area last year. I was thrilled! Read More . . . .

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Growing Up After Camille, Reflections on Katrina

by Ana Maria


Thirty-eight years ago today Hurricane Camille hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. I was but a child of ten. Our family home had been built on the highest land in Hancock County. We slept in the hall. One of the families in the neighborhood stayed with us bringing their grandkids with them. Great! More people to play with my younger brother and me.

I remember the eye of Hurricane Camille when the storm got deadly silent, truly the calm before the hurricane kicked up all over again but from the opposite direction. Someone opened the door and one of my older brothers had a rope around his waist as he ventured outside to check on the family dog in the shed. Peering out the door, all I could see were trees that Camille had knocked down making the outside appear as though we were inside Sherwood Forest.

My family and our neighbors were lucky. No real lasting damage. Just down the road a mile or so, families took in nine feet of water in their homes. We had a bit of roof damage and nearly every tree in our yard, save three, had been knocked down. But we were safe, had a home, and plenty of running water. At the time, my family’s water came from a neighboring well, which the hurricane did not damage. My family opened up our home to others not so fortunate. People lined up to take cold showers.

To this day, 38 years after that historic hurricane, memories of sounds quickly bring me back to that time. Wherever I hear a chainsaw, I immediately recall the buzzing of saws clearing roads after Camille. The National Guard were Johnny on the spot helping folks with all the heavy post-disaster relief efforts. The Red Cross leveraged the organizing and management skills of local leaders like my own mother who coordinated many of the efforts to help families in the wake of Camille’s aftermath.

I remember each of these things with a sort of childlike feeling of being cared for, of community coming together, of an American government and institutions focused on helping its own people with what matters most—family, community, safety.

My younger brother and I were sent to stay with one of many relatives living in New Orleans, which Camille hadn’t hit. As a kid, I wasn’t particularly happy about leaving home, but I adored all of my relatives so the separation became more than tolerable for a kid who had just experienced something quite scary.

Reflections on Katrina’s Children
What will Katrina’s children recall once they grow up into adults? The National Guard that should have been helping with Katrina’s aftermath was not available to help out with the cleanup. George W. Bush had wrongly started a war with a country in which we are now mired in a Vietnam-like war. Bush pushed our weekend warriors into 24/7 military service in Iraq . Guess Bush is grateful that Nixon didn’t put the National Guard in Vietnam. If Nixon had, Bush would have had to find other ways to escape serving his country.

So when the National Guard should have been here in the U.S. helping in Katrina’s aftermath—just as they had been in Camille’s aftermath, they were in Iraq in the only war Bush has ever been remotely interested in some involvement—if only for the photo ops.

Katrina’s kids won’t have the fond memories of the National Guard that I acquired after Camille.

Perhaps today’s children will remember the kind faces of thousands of volunteers and family members across the country that helped. But when destruction remains everywhere some two years after the storm, it may not be enough to heal the sense of abandonment and immense hardship imposed by a White House that has failed miserably to take care of its responsibilities to its people.

Yesterday, I wrote about a young mother and her two children living in an itty, bitty, teeny tin formaldehyde-filled FEMA trailer in my hometown. Her little boy was jumping everywhere as 3-year olds are want to do. He has no playground or yard or park to play in. The trailer is tinier than any one-bedroom apartment I’ve ever lived in. Maybe 300 square feet.

After school had let out, older kids entered the trailer park laughing and giggling making plans to get together after touching base with their families. Many seemed about ten years old or so—the age I had been when Camille hit the town. I wonder what their view of government will be? How will the destruction of all that they had once known, neighborhoods and communities that continue to struggle to come back, how will that impact these kids?

Back on that fateful Sunday of August 17, 1969, my family and I attended Mass as we did every Sunday. Our congregation prayed for protection from the hurricane headed our way. Today, on Camille’s 38th anniversary, I pray for continued strength to envision life full of vibrancy . . . and normalcy.

Yesterday, I drove through Diamondhead, Miss., which is literally on the northern side of I-10, about 15 miles north of my hometown of Bay St. Louis, Miss. It, too, had had much of Katrina’s destruction. One cousin’s home was completely demolished. But not all of the city received Katrina's wrath.

As I wound through the streets, these neighborhoods looked . . . normal. I kept saying out loud was how lovely it is to remember what life is like with houses that are well-kept, gardens manicured, lawns cut. I drove for quite a while remembering life before I arrived here in March. For me, it was a breath of fresh air. I hadn’t realized how much I had already acclimated to seeing the destruction that is so prevalent but a few miles down the road.

These scenes are how life looked pre-Katrina along the Gulf Coast and to the west of us in the greater New Orleans area then over to the east over to Alabama. Once again, I began to yearn.

I yearn for the ease of the life that I had before coming home. I yearn for it for myself. I yearn for it for my family. I yearn for it for my friends and neighbors. For here on the Mississippi Gulf Coast all the way east to Bayou Le Batre, Alabama, and west throughout the levee flooded areas of New Orleans and its surrounding cities.

And, the children like Keisha’s little boy. I yearn that he, his sister, and his mother will soon be surrounded by the beauty of their own rooms in their own home in a neighborhood where kids go outside to play and get dirty until their mom calls them inside for lunch or supper or to do their chores or whathaveyou. That’s what my mom did when I was a kid growing up here after Camille. Katrina kids deserve the same normalcy.
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Broadening Katrina’s Lens: A Five-Part Series
Part 1: Broadening Katrina's Lens
Part 2: Recovery’s Two Major Impediments: $$$ and the "F" word
Part 3: The "F" Word: FEMA
Part 4: Katrina’s Bigger Picture
Part 5: Katrina’s Karmic Payback: Insurance Reform
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Read, bookmark, subscribe to A.M. in the Morning! . . . . . . dispatches from Katrina's ground zero with Ana Maria,a distinctly progressive political voice.
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Young Mother in FEMA Trailer Yearns for Home

by Ana Maria

Through stinging, burning eyes I listened as WLOX-TV 13 filmed a conversation between a young single mother of two living in a FEMA trailer and John Eaves, Mississippi’s Democratic Gubernatorial Nominee. Rare is the interview with FEMA residents.

The Bush Administration had created a FEMA policy that deliberately prevented press and FEMA residents from talking with each other. Bush’s policy violated our First Amendment Freedom of the Press that our nation’s founders put into our U.S. Constitution.

A year ago, FEMA representative James Stark spoke with The Advocate, the Baton Rouge, Louisiana, paper that had published the article on Bush's FEMA tearing up our Constitutional right to a free press. Stark said, “we shouldn't be trying to muzzle the press.” No joke. This isn’t communist Russia. For clarification, this is the United States of America. Got it?! We value freedom even if the occupants of the White House do not.

Keisha is in her late 20s and a single mother of a daughter and son. Katrina destroyed her car and her rental home. Because childcare has been non-existent since the storm, she has been unable to go to work. Her youngest will go to pre-school later this month. On his first day of school, Keisha will start her new job at Popeyes Fried Chicken fast food restaurant. [The best onion rings on the planet, I’m telling ya.] Popeyes is a long way from Keisha's formaldehyde-filled trailer to walk in the scorching heat and humidity that is typical for August and September here in Bay St. Louis, Miss.

When we drove up to the FEMA park, I was absolutely astonished. I had driven by the place a bazillion times since I arrived here in my hometown to visit my family in March. The trailer park sits behind a large white fence, which hides it from view, and hide it well the fence did. I still cannot believe that what must have been at least a hundred FEMA trailers on gravel grounds completely unsuitable for children to play safely or animals to run about or disabled individuals to maneuver around sits behind a fence I’ve seen plenty but never saw through. It’s blocked from view from the street.

We must have been in Keisha’s trailer for a good 20-30 minutes. My eyes burned for hours on end. Keisha said that she has gone to the emergency room in the hospital across the street four times for depression and migraines. All she years for are the same things all of us in the Katrina-ravaged region want: to take care of family, to go home, to return to pre-Katrina life.

John Eaves listened intently to the young woman as she eagerly told her story in hopes that somehow she can obtain relief from the extremely small FEMA trailer. Whether talking with Keisha or the other trailer residents, he mentioned several things that resonated with them and with me.

Referring to them as money changers, Eaves talked of Mississippians being taken advantaged of by Big Insurance, Big Oil, and Big Pharmacy. Clearly a biblical reference which resonates well with many Mississippians, money changers is as good a phrase to use to describe those big industries that revere money over being good corporate citizens and doing right while making a living.

Before the storm, Keisha and her two kids lived with her mother in a two-bedroom home. After Katrina destroyed the house, the owner replaced it with a one-bedroom home. Her mother moved back in, but there is no room for Keisha and her two kids. It’s only a one bedroom place.

How brave this young woman is to talk to total strangers on camera. Fiercely determined to do the best she can for her own children, would that those sitting in the White House shared her sense of valuing children and family.

What will she and her family do come January when Bush’s FEMA kicks them out?

Affordable housing remains unavailable. It’s not that there is an abundance of housing, and it is simply financially unaffordable. There simply isn’t a lot of housing, and what is available is out of financial reach.

One after another story—Keisha’s included—talks of rents doubling since Katrina. Where in these United States can families afford easily to squeeze doubling of their rent or mortgage payments into their household budgets? Whether Manhattan or Montana, the Bay Area of San Francisco or Bay St. Louis, Miss., doubling raw housing costs is no walk in the park. Like big oil at the gas pumps, sure does look like price gouging.

What Keisha and other FEMA trailer residents know as well as every other resident in the Katrina region is that money is the single resource that is scarce around these parts. Making the insurance companies pay up on their wind policies would quickly change the terrain around here.

Houses and apartment complexes would begin to be rebuilt. Businesses and houses of worship would begin construction. Government buildings like jails and schools would break ground.

Jobs would be plentiful. With those jobs would be benefits to help maintain the health of these families.

Forcing the federal government to actually spend the appropriated money here on the ground—Waveland or Pass Christian or Bay St. Louis, Miss., or Slidell or New Orleans, Louisiana—will dramatically alter life in a most positive direction.

And with that, the weariness that is in everyone’s eyes, the heaviness weighing on the collective minds and hearts of those struggling—which includes everyone, and the depression hidden behind our region’s well-known smiling and gracious hospitality will begin to disappear.

As the money changes hands from the federal bureaucrats to the local folks here on the ground and from the insurance companies coffers to the rightful hands of its policy holders, the sunny, cheery, optimistic perspective that life is getting better everyday—a perspective that is as embedded in our American culture as baseball, hot dogs, and apple pie—this perspective will rise and shine as brightly as the beautiful sun shining down upon our humble but beautiful Gulf Coast.


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FEMA, how would you like your eggs?

by Ana Maria

Clearly the first meaning for the initials A.M. in my blog’s name, A.M. in the Morning! is my own name—Ana Maria. However, the other meaning of AM is Adult Maturity.

“What being an adult means is knowing what you have to do and doing it, even though you may not feel like doing it.”

Robert T. Kiyosaki
Rich Dad’s Cashflow Quadrant

Since publishing my first blog entry on May 1st of this year—Like Walking Through Glue—I have learned that Katrina was a great equalizer bringing out the real character in plenty of folks, bringing out shared core values, and waking up people—myself included—in new ways.

For those that have heard the cries of the hundreds of thousands and are helping through volunteering time, goods, services and money, I say thank you. For those that have contracted their congressional representatives and U.S. Senators to pass the critical pieces of legislation to bring down insurance rates and to bring that industry in alignment with the same rules by which every other industry must abide, I say thank you.

Doing what needs doing because it needs to be done is the mature, adult thing to do. Again, thanks to everyone.

Plenty of church folks have come here doing a ton of hard, dirty work. No fanfare. No banners. No press releases. Just showing up--even today after almost two years. Lots of other, non-affiliated folks have spent plenty of time down here.

Yesterday, two friends told me about another group: the Rainbow people, the hippie tent as locals called it. One friend is a democrat and the other, a Republican. Both were elated with all the volunteer help, but the hippie group was a high point.

Apparently this group got down here within a few days of Katrina, set up shop, and began serving free hot, delicious food. “How would you like your eggs?” Rainbow hippies would ask the beat-all-to-hell-and-back Katrina survivors. They got here before Bush's FEMA.

Yet, when Bush’s FEMA finally got some boots here at ground zero in Waveland, Miss., Bush’s agency tried to get the group thrown out of town.

“WHAT?! Why?” I asked excitedly, and not in a good way.

My friends told me that the hippies were showing up FEMA, and FEMA didn't like it.

Huh? I didn’t quite get it. In an emergency, all hands on deck. Every volunteer embraced. Each new available resource much appreciated.

Uh, no. Not with FEMA.

My friends told me that Bush’s FEMA officials asked Waveland Mayor Tommy Longo to throw the Rainbow hippies off the public land. Longo apparently said that if he was going to throw anybody off the land it would be FEMA. It wasn't FEMA setting up three hot meals a day asking folks how they wanted their eggs cooked. But, it should have been.

When the Rainbow hippies left area, the folks here honored them with a parade. Given how Bush’s FEMA has treated everyone, it would be hell bent to get such treatment. At times, I'm sure folks would rather have run them out of town.

See down here, particularly on the western part of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, we’ll give you the shirt off of our backs, feed you the best tasting meals you have ever put into your mouths, and dance your feet off under the stars just for the sheer joy of it. It’s in our blood, our collective DNA.

BUT! You mess with us, our baseline survival especially after any kind of disaster like Camille in ’69 or Katrina in ’05, and well, we’re like the best combo of redneck and the Bronx—and our accents often reflect the enormous diversity of those geographical regions.

I believe this story about Mayor Longo, because I recall as a 10 year old girl hearing the story of my own father and a few other men from our neighborhood going to get the rationed gallons of milk after Hurricane Camille devastated the Mississippi Gulf Coast. A couple of truckers were sitting in their cabs when one turned to the other and mentioned something about taking off, that these people didn’t need the milk.

Apparently this was within earshot of my dad and the other men. From what I recall, the men—including my dad—threatened the truckers within an inch of their lives. Commodities were scarce. They had families and neighbors to take care of.

My own family didn’t need the milk. My dad went to get our family’s ration so that we could hand the milk to a neighbor who had toddlers.

We can be a generous lot down here. Just don’t mess with us, particularly when it comes to baseline survival. We will do what needs doing, and if you are in the way, well, at the very least you may experience our own version of verbal jiu jitsu. The skill comes in handy.

Today, we can all use a little practice in the verbal jiu jitsu arena. As I’m writing this, insurance lobbyists are out talking with our congressional representative and two U.S. Senators whispering their corporate propaganda. Fine, let them. This is America. That is their right.

As is often the case, the outcome doesn’t rely on watching them, getting aggravated at what they are doing, examining them under a microscope to talk expertly about their every move. The outcome doesn’t rely on that.

The outcome relies on us. What we do. How well we perform our collective role in this grand experiment in American democracy. Think of it as being one of many thousands of ants at a picnic.

Everyone of those often too numerable to count at a picnic can ruin the most festive of occasions. Well, the insurance industry has picnicked off of us for far too long. This may not be the most appetizing of analogies, but we all get the point.

We have a role to play in the political arena, and playing it faithfully is our right, our responsibility, and, quite frankly, our duty.

We all know what that means. It’s political hell raising time! Yoohooo! What fun! Look for some, exercising our 1st Amendment rights may be the only real exercising we get today. So, let’s do it with gusto!

Today’s fun-filled political hell raising activities
First, we’ll contact our own congressional representatives and tell them that we need one policy for both wind and water. Call and email using these phone scripts and email letters as is a way to easily look up the phone numbers and email addresses for congressional representatives. Or course, edit as you desire. Yes, all of this is provided courtesy of yours truly. The eloquence of our call or email is unimportant to achieving the goal. We need only be certain to make contact.

Secondly we’re going to build the big MO—political momentum. It’s like those tiny ants at the picnic. To ruin a picnic, they seem to automatically multiply all over the place, don’t they? That’s us. We’re going to multiply our efforts through the second of today’s political hell raising activities.

How? We’re going to contact friends, family members, and colleagues to ask them to join us in these at-our-fingertips political hell-raising activities. One way to encourage them is by clicking on the tiny envelop at the end of the full article (online). Type in the email address of a friend, relative, or colleague. Type in a message and click “send email.” A link to this post will be delivered with the charming, encouraging, magnetic email note you’ve written.

With everyone doing just a little bit, we can make this political load light as a feather! A few phone calls here and emails there from all of us around the country will help create the big Mo! We may feel like tiny ants in the big world of politics. However, all we have to remember is how many picnics we’ve attended where ants ruined it for us while having a field day. There’s a picnic before us, and it has our name on it. Eggs anyone?
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Broadening Katrina’s Lens: A five Part Series
Part 1: Broadening Katrina's Lens
Part 2: Recovery’s Two Major Impediments: $$$ and the "F" word
Part 3: The "F" Word: FEMA
Part 4: Katrina’s Bigger Picture
Part 5: Katrina’s Karmic Payback: Insurance Reform

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