AUSTIN ADVOCATE |
Way Below the Poverty (and Water) Line
By Clive Whistle
Saturday, September 3, 2005
People walking aimlessly in the streets, food preparation on the sidewalk, people pushing shopping carts on the bridges and causeways filled with blankets, bits of clothes and a half-consumed jug of water. Homeless people? Panhandlers? Recyclers? No- survivors of Hurricane Katrina in the ravaged streets of Mississippi, New Orleans and parts of Florida.
And of course they are homeless, because they, the very poorest of our US citizenry, barely surviving on underground economies, food stamps, and SSI, on land that was long ago declared unsafe due to its proximity to weak levees, shores, power plants, roads and freeways were always at-risk of losing the only thing they had, the only thing all poor folks have if they have anything at all; day to day subsistence/existence.
All we have is our patterns of money collection, our little to-up roof, our broken down beds, barely working cars or bicycles, our few clothes, our chipped dishes, our static-filled TV's and a little bit better boom boxes, ….
And when those things are gone, due to eviction, disaster, emergency or crisis, we have lost it all.
It reminds me of my experience with the Northern California Earthquake of 89. When people talk laughingly about where they were, a shudder travels through my body. When that earthquake hit, we had just earned enough in our underground economy street based "job" to pay that months rent in our little Oakland apartment. When that earthquake hit, it meant we had to use the money just to eat cause there was no money to be made on the streets following that disaster, which meant we couldn’t pay the rent and we ended up homeless once again.
As us poor folks, barely holding onto our meager bits of nothing, in other parts of the country watch the discrimination of our fellow poor folk in the South, we can only hope that if they even survive this disgusting new blow to their already difficult American existences they are able to recoup a little modicum of stability/normalcy/peace in the long hard days to come.
Or perhaps, like me, through losing everything just one mo time, they will become angry enough to stop trying to just survive, and instead live to resist, the racist, classist system that is locked in place to hold them down.
Reprinted from Street News Service
Notes From Inside New Orleans
Jordan Flaherty
Friday, September 2, 2005
I just left New Orleans a couple hours ago. I traveled from the apartment I was staying in by boat to a helicopter to a refugee camp.
If anyone wants to examine the attitude of federal and state officials towards the victims of hurricane Katrina, I advise you to visit one of the refugee camps.
In the refugee camp I just left, ! on the I-10 freeway near Causeway, thousands of people (at least 90% black and poor) stood and squatted in mud and trash behind metal barricades, under an unforgiving sun, with heavily armed soldiers standing guard over them. When a bus would come through, it would stop at a random spot, state police would open a gap in one of the barricades, and people would rush for the bus, with no information given about where the bus was going.
Once inside (we were told) evacuees would be told where the bus was taking them - Baton Rouge, Houston, Arkansas, Dallas, or other locations. I was told that if you boarded a bus bound for Arkansas (for example), even people with family and a place to stay in Baton Rouge would not be allowed to get out of the bus as it passed through Baton Rouge. You had no choice but to go to the shelter in Arkansas.
If you had people willing to come to New Orleans to pick you up, they could not come within 17 miles of the camp.
I traveled throughout the camp and spoke to Red Cross workers, Salvation Army workers, National Guard, and state police, and although they were friendly, no one could give me any details on when buses would arrive, how many, where they would go to, or any other information. I spoke to the several teams of journalists nearby, and asked if any of them had been able to get any information from any federal or state officials on any of these questions, and all of them, from Australian tv to local Fox affiliates complained of an unorganized, non-communicative, mess. One cameraman told me "as someone who's been here in this camp for two days, the only information I can give you is this: get out by nightfall. You don't want to be here at night."
There was also no visible attempt by any of those running the camp to set up any sort of transparent and consistent system, for instance, a line to get on buses, a way to register contact information or find family members, special needs services for children and infirm, phone services, treatment for possible disease exposure, nor even a single trash can.
To understand this tragedy, its important to look at New Orleans itself.
For those who have not lived in New Orleans, you have missed a incredible, glorious, vital, city. A place with a culture and energy unlike anywhere else in the world. A 70% African-American city where resistance to white supremecy has supported a generous, subversive and unique culture of vivid beauty. From jazz, blues and hiphop, to secondlines, Mardi Gras Indians, Parades, Beads, Jazz Funerals, and red beans and rice on Monday nights, New Orleans is a place of art and music and dance and sexuality and liberation unlike anywhere else in the world.
It is a city of kindness and hospitality, where walking down the block can take two hours because you stop and talk to someone on every porch, and where a community pulls together when someone is in need. It is a city of extended families and social networks filling the gaps left by city, state and federal goverments that have abdicated their responsibility for the public welfare. It is a city where someone you walk past on the street not only asks how you are, they wait for an answer.
It is also a city of exploitation and segregation and fear. The city of New Orleans has a population of just over 500,000 and was expecting 300 murders this year, most of them centered on just a few, overwhelmingly black, neighborhoods. Police have been quoted as saying that they don't need to search out the perpetrators, because usually a few days after a shooting, the attacker is shot in revenge.
There is an atmosphere of intense hostility and distrust between much of Black New Orleans and the N.O. Police Department. In recent months, officers have been accused of everything from drug running to corruption to theft. In seperate incidents, two New Orleans police officers were recently charged with rape (while in uniform), and there have been several high profile police killings of unarmed youth, including the murder of Jenard Thomas, which has inspired ongoing weekly protests for several months.
The city has a 40% illiteracy rate, and over 50% of black ninth graders will not graduate in four years. Louisiana spends on average $4,724 per child's education and ranks 48th in the country for lowest teacher salaries. The equivalent of more than two classrooms of young people drop out of Louisiana schools every day and about 50,000 students are absent from school on any given day. Far too many young black men from New Orleans end up enslaved in Angola Prison, a former slave plantation where inmates still do manual farm labor, and over 90% of inmates eventually spend their lives and die in the prison. It is a city where industry has left, and most remaining jobs are are low-paying, transient, insecure jobs in the service economy.
Race has always been the undercurrent of Louisiana politics. This disaster is one that was constructed out of racism, neglect and incompetence. Hurricane Katrina was the inevitable spark igniting the gasoline of cruelty and corruption. From the neighborhoods left most at risk, to the treatment of the refugees to the the media portayal of the victims, this disaster is shaped by race.
Louisiana politics is famously corrupt, but with the tragedies of this week our political leaders have defined a new level of incompetence. As hurricane Katrina approached, our Governor urged us to "Pray the hurricane down" to a level two. Trapped in a building two days after the hurricane, we tuned our battery-operated radio into local radio and tv stations, hoping for vital news, and were told that our governor had called for a day of prayer. As rumors and panic began to rule, they was no source of solid dependable information. Tuesday night, politicians and reporters said the water level would rise another 12 feet - instead it stabilized. Rumors spread like wildfire, and the politicians and media only made it worse.
While the rich escaped New Orleans, those with nowhere to go and no way to get there were left behind. Adding salt to the wound, the local and national media have spent the last week demonizing those left behind. As someone that loves New Orleans and the people in it, this is the part of this tragedy that hurts me the most, and it hurts me deeply.
No sane person should classify someone who takes food from indefinitely closed stores in a desperate, starving city as a "looter," but thats just what the media did over and over again. Sherrifs and politicians talked of having troops protect stores instead of perform rescue operations.
Images of New Orleans' hurricane-ravaged population were transformed into black, out-of-control, criminals. As if taking a stereo from a store that will clearly be insured against loss is a greater crime than the governmental neglect and incompetence that did billions of dollars of damage and destroyed a city. This media focus is a tactic, just as the eighties focus on "welfare queens" and "super-predators" obscured the simultaneous and much larger crimes of the Savings and Loan scams and mass layoffs, the hyper-exploited people of New Orleans are being used as a scapegoat to cover up much larger crimes.
City, state and national politicians are the real criminals here. Since at least the mid-1800s, its been widely known the danger faced by flooding to New Orleans. The flood of 1927, which, like this week's events, was more about politics and racism than any kind of natural disaster, illustrated exactly the danger faced. Yet government officials have consistently refused to spend the money to protect this poor, overwhelmingly black, city. While FEMA and others warned of the urgent impending danger to New Orleans and put forward proposals for funding to reinforce and protect the city, the Bush administration, in every year since 2001, has cut or refused to fund New Orleans flood control, and ignored scientists warnings of increased hurricanes as a result of global warming. And, as the dangers rose with the floodlines, the lack of coordinated response dramatized vividly the callous disregard of our elected leaders.
The aftermath from the 1927 flood helped shape the elections of both a US President and a Governor, and ushered in the southern populist politics of Huey Long.
In the coming months, billions of dollars will likely flood into New Orleans. This money can either be spent to usher in a "New Deal" for the city, with public investment, creation of stable union jobs, new schools, cultural programs and housing restoration, or the city can be "rebuilt and revitalized" to a shell of its former self, with newer hotels, more casinos, and with chain stores and theme parks replacing the former neighborhoods, cultural centers and corner jazz clubs.
Long before Katrina, New Orleans was hit by a hurricane of poverty, racism, disinvestment, de-industrialization and corruption. Simply the damage from this pre-Katrina hurricane will take billions to repair.
Now that the money is flowing in, and the world's eyes are focused on Katrina, its vital that progressive-minded people take this opportunity to fight for a rebuilding with justice. New Orleans is a special place, and we need to fight for its rebirth.
Reprinted from Street News Service: www.streetnewsservice.org
Evacuees Treated Well in Austin
By Brenda Curran
A little over 2,000 evacuees from flood ravaged New Orleans are staying at the Austin Convention Center according to David Matustik, Public Information Manager with the City of Austin. He took me and our photographer Sam Cook on a tour of the facilities.
As you walk in to the Convention Center you can see the services available. There are rows and rows of tables providing services such as housing, legal aid, insurance, banking, AISD (kids are starting school on Monday), Capital Metro, Child Support, Apt. Rental information, WIC, Caritas, Safe Place, Family Elder Care, and Goodwill.
We found Patricia Brent and her daughter Patrice waiting in line for housing. Patricia is completely devastated by this catastrophe. She lived on the bridge outside the Super Dome for 4 days before being rescued by helicopter and brought to Austin by bus.
She has a Masters Degree in Education and says she never thought she would be in a position like this. She plans to stay in Austin for about a year before returning to New Orleans. She says that the schools is New Orleans are destroyed and that there are plenty of teaching jobs in Austin with all the kids from Louisiana registered for school.
Patricia says that Austin is doing a wonderful job and that they could give lessons to Louisiana about how to help the evacuees.
In the line for FEMA we found Deon Ricard. She, too, is from New Orleans and has her nine children with her. She said that 5 are going to school on Monday. She is eligible for Section 8 housing since she was living in a Section 8 house in New Orleans.
Ricard is planning on staying in Austin and said she will not return to New Orleans.
She was rescued by a Sheriff from Georgia who came in a helicopter carrying a machine gun.
She said she believes that everything will work out okay and that she believes in God and trusts Him to help her.
Photos by Sam Cole
Hurricane Katrina: Insider Southern Poverty Report
Clive Whistle
This is me, folks, Clive Whistle, Poverty Magazine roving reporter and poverty scholar, writing from the flooded streets of my beloved hometown of New Orleans. The funny thing for me is I have been homeless on and off in my life, but when I go home, I do mean HOME, to my people, I am housed in heart and soul if not in house.
This is true in particular when I go home to my grandmama, who like my editor says, might as well be homeless as she has lived in a ramshackle shack with no decent roof on the edge of town for as long as I can remember, but who lives by the old adage, poor is a state of mind, and from her perspective and the whole community, she is about as housed as one human being can be.
Now that I finally got public housing in Frisco, I went back " home" this time to visit and help family even poorer than me like Gramama who is still dwelling in unbelievably substandard housing in New Orleans, with open sewers, tenuous levees and walls that shake when anyone touches them. This kind of Southern poverty is so intense that Peace Corps volunteers train for Africa by "volunteering" in places like New Orleans, Missipippi and Oklahoma.
So, I am writing now (through telephonic transcription via Poverty Magazine staff in Frisco) to let folks no that yes it is very scary here, some of the untold stories, though are the heroes, who in this case are just everyday people, but also a lot of the storefront church pastors who, through daily spiritual guidance and physical help, have been amazing in all the worst scenarios.
As well, I am feeling the vibe of people like my Poverty Magazine editors who are worried that this is just the next Bush/Cheny plan for massive poor people displacement, i.e. they are not letting people stay in New Orleans and they are not promising us any time soon that we will be able to come back, Bourban Street- ala Disney Corporation.
The other untold story which is a heads-up to Leroy and all the folks working on race and disability issues is the way that all disabled people, white and Black, were treated in all this. Unless you had family caring about you - and you were disabled in the floods, you might as well have given up. Several poor ladies in wheel chairs in the Dome were just stashed in dark corners, left to die. I tried to help as many of them as I could, but there was no help, no respect, no sanity, no nothing.
Send us your love and prayers, I am still searching for my grammama, but so far no luck.
© Poor Magazine Online
Reprinted from Street News Service
Henry Romness 4-27-1930 to 7-29-2005
By Valerie Romness
I knew my Uncle Henry as a traveler. He had itchy feet so to speak. He liked to just ride and look out the window at the scenery of life. In the late 1980’s I gave Henry an open invitation to come see me in Texas. In 1990 I had become a homeless advocate. I got a call from Uncle Henry at the greyhound bus station in Nov 1995. I was working, but was able to pick him up on my break.
Being short notice Henry had to come with me for my plans of advocacy. Almost right away we signed up to speak to City Council against the Austin Camping Ordinance. I spoke first, and then Henry was right behind me to encourage the council to develop good shelters. His experience of traveling sometimes led him to stay in shelters (Grand Forks Mission) where he’d clean in exchange for a place to say. He appeared on Dialogues for the Homeless, a TV show I had just started hosting. He gave the senior view. Henry didn’t always stay right with me in my home. He found solace and friendship with the guys on the street. They camped in the bamboo and the woods near Zilker Park. He made good friends with the ones I knew and introduced me to more. The guys drew strength from my Uncle Henry. They admired his perseverance for happiness at his age of 65. He brought joy to may lives.
Henry spent 5 years in Texas winters from “95 to 2001. The summers he’d spend in the vicinity of Southern Minnesota with family. He got a couple apartments in Austin, one even in Paris… North Texas that is...
We all have our own interpretation of what happens. Henry shared some things with me that he remembered. He told me in 1952 when my parents Pete & Dawn got married, that his parents arrived to the cities, in their Model T Ford… He got me to make macaroni and cream corn. Sounded weird, but then I remembered my Grama Romness used to make it. I was 6 yrs old when she died. Henry said he believed he & his sister Barb were the last ones to see their mother before she died.
Henry and I shared a similar spirituality, the “Church of the latter day tracks”: An appreciation of the outdoors, trees, wind, grass, & dirt. Or sometimes we’d go to the Church under the Bridge. He liked to sing gospel songs. He’d move his arms like a maestro while he was singing.
“I don’t know if it’ll do any good…”, he’d say, about our advocacy together. I’m sure we made a good impression.
He did do his best to make amends with his family, so I’m very glad his last 4 yrs were close to home in Minnesota. He would miss everyone while he was in Texas. But while he was with me, it was so good to have family conversations with him. He was sweet. Good hugs.
“They’re calling me” he’d say when he heard the sound of the train whistle. I asked if he ever rode the rails, not no more he said. He did one time just up & disappear from me, when he went on the bus to San Antonio. He just wanted to get away. Now Henry has caught the Big Train to Heaven.
I'm sad to loose Henry, he was like a 2nd Dad to me in Texas. I’m proud of my Uncle: he came full circle with his family. I’d like to thank Richard Troxell for leading Henry to ACCESS at ARCH. The folks at ACCESS really handled his needs well.
Hospitality to Evacuees
Bumps Austin’s homeless to the back of the line
By Trisha Yeager Menke
Austin’s homeless deserve our respect!
But we turn away, and instead reject
Our homeless folk who struggle to live
By holding up signs that say “Please Give!
Just a dollar or two—or maybe more.
It’s hot out here and our feet are sore!”
Most folks pass by with hardly a glance
Their eyes glazed over, as though in a trance.
“They’re bums”, they say, “Too lazy to work,
Or when given a chance, their duties they shirk.”
Yes, we neglect our own homeless, and fail to provide
Food, shelter, clean clothes—to restore their pride!
Some government leaders want to make it a crime
To give to “Panhandlers”—as much as a dime!
“Get them off the streets where they can’t be seen,
They’re dangerous, sick, and not even clean!”
Their words make me sad. If they only knew
But for the grace of God, they’d be there too!
Yet, when disaster strikes those in a different city,
We rush to their aid, our hearts filled with pity.
We spend millions of dollars. The cost matters not.
“After all, they deserve it! They’ve suffered a lot!”
We open our homes, as good neighbors should.
It’s the right thing to do and it makes us feel good!
We’re hypocrites just like it says in the Word
Standing on pulpits trying to be heard
So all will know what kindness we show
And the many good deeds we gladly bestow.
Well, helping the poor is all well and fine,
But why send our OWN to the back of the line?
Iraqis are We,
if we are all trully free.
What constitution?
Disrespect others
who choose not to play along
whatever the scam.
Ethical cxave man
the church of stongest survives,
transferred money.
Wealth falsifies peace.
Wealth at best is wars end goal.
Wealth abused by one.
Sharing and caring
we play picking and choosing,
after us of course.
Talk of salvation,
by rapture to perfection,
disrespects the Earth.
Blind religion
would have us become childlike,
sacrificial lambs.
Parents brainwash us
according to their their brainwash,
long for how it was.
Day and night lament
for childhood comfort zone
disregards th future.
No-bid contractors
looting worse than Waterthief
bringing wages down.
Yes close the bases,
open new communities.
Peace within our hearts.
Tumen Soliz
“Thoughts”
Hello, my friend
Haven’t heard from you, in some time.
And so, we meet again.
Just to come to find.
Where the places are, that we have been.
Are only memories, in our minds.
We carry with us, all we have seen, said, and done.
And try to leave some things behind.
Not so easy, at times, it seems.
In this world of yours and mine.
Caught by the camera eye, scene by scene.
By eyes that see, and yet, are blind.
Refusing to see, that which is “being”.
As being only of it’s kind.
But all of them begin to heed.
When the dream, comes to life.
Knowing the want and having the need.
Of everything, within their sights.
Reaping harvests without sowing the seed.
That is necessary to survive.
And it seems, my friend, to happen all over again.
When the worlds within, collide.
We both go back, to where we have been.
Deciding, on what to decide.
Seeking to justify all means to the end.
Wondering, what is there to hide.
While really not knowing, where to begin.
The thoughts, just crossed our minds.
Todd
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Way Below the Poverty Notes From Inside New Orleans Evacuees Treated Well in Austin Henry Romness Poetry Hospitality to Evacuees Iraqis are We Thoughts |
