Jewish Community News

News: September 2008

The third anniversary of Katrina

By Diane Fisher

“True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.”
   —Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

   Thirty debates came and went during the presidential primaries, but not one moderator took the opportunity to ask the candidates how they plan to help rebuild communities in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast. In terms of physical devastation, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the levee failure caused more damage than our three largest disasters combined: the September 11 attacks, Hurricane Andrew and the Northridge earthquake. But three years after Katrina, the Gulf Coast is still defined by FEMA trailers, tent cities, and the echoes of people yearning to return home.
     Hanging on my office wall is a faded black-and-white photo of Rabbi Joshua Heschel, marching with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1965 in Selma, reminding me daily of a time when the African-American and Jewish communities stood together. Congress passed The Voting Rights Act, and President Johnson signed it into law, but only after grass-roots efforts put civil rights on the front burner and spoke truth to power loudly and clearly. When the Jewish Council for Public Affairs called and asked if we would send a Jewish and an African-American delegate to their Mission to New Orleans, I didn’t know what I know now. Rev. Jeff Moore (NAACP president) and I both now know that 40 years after Dr. King’s assassination, it is our turn to continue his legacy. It is our turn to put on the front burner the economic and social justice rights of all Americans, including those who are most vulnerable.
    The Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Silicon Valley was one of four CRCs nationwide to send a delegation of Jewish and African-American leaders down to the Big Easy for the Jewish Council for Public Affairs Mission to New Orleans in June. Our bus took us on a “disaster tour,” through the Ninth Ward, St. Bernard Parish and New Orleans East. Rev. Jeff Moore had an emotional four days. “I saw, felt and experienced as an outsider looking in and back at this country’s most embarrassing moments during my trip to New Orleans. You can see it in their faces: the hurt, the loss, the insaneness, the disbelief and sadness. Yet, although some believed that hope was around the corner, it has yet to truly arrive.”
    So we put our hands and hearts into contributing to the rebuilding, painting and cleaning of two houses in a working class parish where 100 percent of the homes were uninhabitable after the storm. We will never forget the eerie sound of an ice cream truck making its way to our site, in a neighborhood that is missing the sound of children and families. In addition to physical work, we spent much time trying to understand the policy and leadership work that is needed to change things.   
    We listened to journalists, academics, council members, and survivors. We came home determined to get involved.
We had not realized that the effort to start up a civic works project that could truly rebuild the Gulf Coast was started right here in the Bay Area, by San Jose State University Professor Scott Meyers-Lipton. His multi-campus college coalition, The Gulf Coast Civic Works Project, inspired Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren to author H.R. 4048.
    This legislation will be  highlighted  at an August 31 community forum titled, “The Eye of Recovery: The Third Anniversary of Katrina,”  at the MLK Library in San Jose, jointly sponsored by the JCRC, NAACP and the SJSU Gulf Coast Civic Works Project. We will continue to bring light to this effort, and encourage Jewish Americans, African-Americans, and all Americans to join in bringing justice and hope to the Gulf Coast.
    Rev. Moore commented, “There is no politics in recovery, no Democrats or Republicans, just people. Mental health experts and social workers are needed, but also people of faith can do a lot to bring
justice and healing to New Orleans.” Y

Diane Fisher is the director of the Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Silicon Valley. For questions, or to participate in this effort, email diane@jvalley.org/.