Houston's Helping Hand: Remembering Katrina

CENTER FOR PUBLIC HISTORY

Houston’s Helping Hand:Remembering

Katrina

VOLUME 7 • NUMBER 3 • SUMMER 2010

I

t was obvious to me when the levies brokethat we were going to be a sanctuary for our fellow Americans who had lost everything. ...I understood that we were the closest big citythat would become a new home for many,many people. ...No city, no community, hadthe experience of dealing with 200,000 peoplethat were not just seeking refuge from a storm but had lost their city. ...I was in problemsolving mode . . . [and] knew that if we ap- pealed to the better nature of our citizens thatwe would get a very broad and deep, com-mitted response to that, which we did. I think the whole world watched and wondered as people within our community came together at a time when the response within the state of Louisiana and the federal government was notvery efcient. ...Even before the storm, when it was clear that [the evacuees] would be here for sometime, I articulated the simple policies of our city. We would want to treat our neighbors aswe would like to be treated, and that meantwe would give people the chance to live withindependence and dignity by working for employment [and] getting their kids in school;for those who were seniors or disabled, wewould be their safety net. ...There were somenaysayers at the outset; but we got broad sup-

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

Our Director of Oral History at the Center for Public History, Ernesto Valdés, conceivedthe idea of doing a commemorative issue onHouston’s response to Hurricane Katrinaalmost immediately after the storm. He beganthe interviews in 2006 and completed the nalone just before his death earlier this year. Thisissue, published on the fth anniversary of Katrina’s landfall on August 29, 2005, is the product of Ernesto’s vision.Mayor Bill White and Judge Robert Eckelstook the lead in coordinating the effortsto respond to the needs of several hundredthousand people who came to the Houstonarea to escape Katrina’s devastation. Mayor White kept an exacting schedule, but at thesame time, remained sensitive to the needs of the evacuees. His direct and humane approachset the tone for all of those in the region whoopened their hearts and even their homes tothose displaced. For example, the HurricaneKatrina Relief Working Group minutes datedSeptember 7, 2005, quoted White as say-ing: “A person at the back of the line seeking benets needs to know the same informationas the guy at the front. We don’t want someonewaiting to nd out they don’t meet the neces-sary requirements. That’s not how we do busi-ness in Houston, Texas.”During a time of great human need, our city provided a model of how strong leaderscan help harness the best efforts of govern-ment, business, and private organizations torespond to emergencies. Houston’s responseto Katrina also reminds us that most effectiveemergency responses in America are essen-tially local, and that they rely on the traditionof volunteerism that has served our nation wellthroughout its history.On June 7, 2010, Mayor White providedhis reections for

Houston History

on how thecity stepped up to provide assistance to themany in need.

Former Houston Mayor, Bill White. Photo courtesyof Bill White.

MAYOR BILL WHITE REMEMBERS KATRINA ON THE STORM’S FIFTH ANNIVERSARY

port, particularly the support that crossed partylines, the support from the faith-based com-munity, and from the business community. As businesses saw . . . what other businesses weredoing, and being asked to do, . . . much of theinitial opposition dissipated. People saw this asan opportunity for us to do something that wasright for our country as well as for our fellowAmericans.We showed that you can be . . . competentand efcient and compassionate at the sametime . . . Too often in the political arena theideas of compassion and efciency are notmarried in the way that we were able to putthem together in the efforts after Katrina. Wealso believe in self sufciency and work, andnot dependency and entitlement, that is partof our heritage in Texas and belief in a limitedgovernment. ...When I met with the evacuees,I emphasized that there were roles and respon-sibilities that we each had. Our responsibility,which we undertook, was to make sure that people had shelter over their heads, utilities,furnishings, [access to] transit lines, and anopportunity for employment if they were able bodied. Their responsibility was to get their kids in school, look forward and not back. Wewould help people return [to New Orleans]; butif they weren’t able to return, then, to seek employment within this community and to helpus identify those people who were engaged incriminal activity, which is a violation of therights of others. That was a Houston style of giving people a hand up, not a hand out.Sometimes I had to remind our fellowcitizens . . . when somebody was living in theshelter, they had as much right to live hereas anyone else in this community, that mostHoustonians had come from somewhere else.If somebody was in a shelter, then we werein their home, not vice versa. ...There wereother parts of the country that segregated people into trailer homes. At one time, FEMAwanted to herd people into a large cruise shipin Galveston, which would have the tendencyto isolate people. Dr. Ken Maddox from BenTaub said that after these mentally traumaticdisasters you see a spike in suicides about aweek to three weeks out because people hadleft everything—their housing, their families,their neighborhoods, their employment. Oncethe adrenalin and the trauma were over, thenthere was a feeling of helplessness. But youdidn’t see that here because people felt theywere part of the community, that others caredfor them, and that they could have a chance toget on with their lives. . . .I was particularly touched by several com-ments I received from people, mainly older people who were African American, who I metin the year after Katrina. ...The rst personwho shared her story said that in her lifetime,she had seen many changes. She had seenlaws change, she had seen the end of ofcialsegregation; but deep in her heart, she doubted.She wondered whether attitudes had reallychanged . . . to really live the ideal that every person is created in the image of God and is nomore worthy than another; she wondered if wehad emerged from that history of racism in our city. When she saw the response of people tak-ing [people from] very different backgrounds,income levels, and ethnicities into their homes,and the outpouring of support where so manyHoustonians simply saw fellow Americans— even while the media was trying to character-ize it as something racial . . .—she said, “Youknow, this has changed.” . . . She told me, “Youhave really forged a real multi-ethnic city.”. . .[Houston has] a tradition of civic leader-ship with mayors going back to Mayor [Louie]Welch who thought that civil rights, andcertainly racial diversity, could be a strengthof our city and not a liability. We had astrong faith-based community that played animportant role in desegregation . . . Even morediverse are the people we have, Houstonianswho were citizens . . . who had come from allover the world. We are more diverse than wehave ever been before. Many people saw thatas a strength. . . . When people realized howmuch they had in common, or could have incommon, with various people who did nothave a home to go back to, the whole worldapplauded the way that we responded. . . . Thatis an enduring legacy.

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VOLUME 7 • NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2010

EDITORIAL STAFF

Joseph A. Pratt,

Editor-in-Chief

Debbie Harwell,

Managing Editor

Aimee L’Heureux,

Associate Editor

Kristin Deville,

Program Coordinator

Marsha Van Horn,

Designer

ADVISORY BOARD

Kathleen BrosnanBetty Trapp ChapmanBarbara EavesSteven Fenberg

EDITORIAL POLICY

Houston History

is published three times a year by the Center for Public History in the HistoryDepartment at the University of Houston. Wewelcome manuscripts, interviews, and photographicessays on the history and culture of the Houstonregion, broadly dened, as well as ideas for topicalissues. All correspondence should be sent to

Houston History

, University of Houston, Center for Public History, 547 Agnes Arnold Hall, Houston,TX 77204-3007 (713-743-3123), or emailed to:

HoustonHistory@uh.edu.

Subscriptions are $10 per year for students, $15 per year for individuals, and $25 per year for institutions.Single issues and back issues are available for $10.Visitwww.history.uh.edu/houstonhistoryfor additional information.© 2010 by the Center for Public History. Allrights reserved. Reproduction of this issue or any portion of it is expressly prohibited without written permission of the publisher. The Center for PublicHistory disclaims responsibility for statements of fact and opinions of contributors.

POSTMASTER

send address changes to:University of HoustonCenter for Public History547 Agnes Arnold HallHouston, TX 77204-3007

Cover Photo:

Artwork by Courtney Persse,daughter of Dr. David Persse. Photo courtesy of Diana Rodriguez.William Kellar Fred KorgeMartin MelosiJim Saye

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Frank McBride: Covering Katrina fromNew Orleans to Houston Page 2

Interview by Ernesto Valdés

Judge Robert Eckels: “We can do whateverwe have to . . .” Page 4

Interview by David Goldstein

Michael Moore: Marshaling Houston’sResources to Make a Difference Page 6

Interview by Ernesto Valdés

Mark Sloan: “The voice of calm,”Coordinating Volunteers Page 12