It hasn’t been that simple for the government or the largest relief organizations, however, and Card expresses outrage at the way funds have been managed and withheld. “Hundreds of millions of dollars were raised,” says Card, and much of that has not yet been spent. “I’ve heard the argument that the money has not come down from [Mississippi governor] Haley Barbour because he’s waiting to make an August 29 announcement on the dispersement of funds.” Bureaucracy, Card argues, is getting in the way of helping people. The solutions aren’t necessarily easy or fast, but they are simple, she says, “and what makes me crazy is that you’ve got all these committees and sub-committees and commissions and studies,” and the money is not getting to the people. “For us to be a year later and not be further along is a failure. And that’s not even arguable. The failure is monumental,” says Card. “The mass emergency is over, but the rebuilding is not. People are living in conditions that no one should have to live in.”
With Mississippi Home Again, Card and Agard have more or less stumbled upon a model for how disaster-relief organizations can and should be run. “What they’ve got going,” says the Red Cross’s Roberts, “is that the money people give buys a stove, buys a fridge.” Compared with the multiple uses to which Red Cross donations can be put, she says, “You can see your money in that stove. And of course it’s not just a stove — it’s a tool of self-sufficiency. People will now be able to help themselves. It’s the difference between giving someone a fish and teaching someone to fish. They’re teaching people to fish.”
Starting out with a scrappy $20,000 in individual donations raised in haste, MHA to date has raised about $160,000 in cash donations and grants and another $320,000 in corporate funding, all from people and organizations who trust MHA to target the money for things people really need, home by home. With several grants in the pipeline, as well as creative marketing arrangements with bed and appliance manufacturers, MHA is planning a budget of $4.2 million during the upcoming year.
MHA has been so successful, in fact, that a FEMA lawyer accused them of breaking into a federal database, says Card, figuring there was no way two people could be doing as much as Card and Agard were doing on their own. (“The stories you’ve heard about FEMA,” Card says, “they’re not urban legend. FEMA people come from a corrupt gene pool.”
In addition to their work with MHA, Card and Agard are also in the process of building a volunteer center in a gymnasium in Pascagoula, Mississippi, which they hope to open in the beginning of September. “When you go online to try to find a place to volunteer, says Card, “sometimes it’s hard to find an organization that isn’t affiliated with a church.” To address that disparity, which might have been an appropriate task for, say, FEMA, Operation TLC Volunteer Center will be outfitted with 150 bunks — all non-denominational.
“It’s absolutely necessary that volunteers keep coming,” says Card. “I don’t think the rest of the country has any idea how horrible it is down here.”
To learn more about MHA or to make a donation, visit mississippihomeagain.org, or send a check to Mississippi Home Again, 6 Bass Road, Peterborough, NH, 03458.
On the Web
MHA: http://www.mississippihomeagain.org
American Red Cross: http://www.redcross.org
Salvation Army: http://www.salvationarmyusa.org/
Catholic Charities' Hurrican Relief: http://www.catholiccharitiesusa.org/news/katrina.cfm
