Weren't there over a million people in New Orleans to begin with? What is happening to all the people who self-evacuated before the storm? Where are they? (I know not being helped by the Red Cross!) To be honest, I am more upset for the middle class homeowners who weren't already on the dole. They have mortgages, car payments, and more to pay and a lifestyle to lose. What's going to happen to them?
Aid from the Feds will be given, but right now they're in a gray area. RC isn't doing anything for them. SA *is*, from what I've heard. Some private efforts are being made.
I can tell you a little, they are in hotels, running out of money, I went to visit a few,,,they can't stomach the thought of going to a shelter---these are harding working *tax payers* and they were smart enough to get out before the storm and now running on 10 days in a hotel at 70$ a night is not cheap,,,,
A couple of my relatives...ahem...have already rented trailers and gotten jobs. Seriously.
Another man here in Houston said that he had 40 people at his house. Some of them had already gotten jobs.
My prediction: Many of the skilled workers will stay at their new locations. Those will job skills in demand will be snapped up by new employers in their new states. When the refugee shelters are closed by the Red Cross the homeless and jobless that remain will be shipped back to New Orleans. The middle class of NO will drastically shrink, the gap between rich and poor will increase.
I asked the same question earlier. Soul searcher gave me an anwer I can only hope is true.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1477440/posts?page=2545#2545
Most of them headed north towards Alexandria. The first few days they were here, they were spending money freely like tourists, thinking this was only a 4-day trip to ride out the storm. You couldn't get a table at places like Applebee's. Then reality set in and they were evicted from their rooms at nice places like the LaQuinta on the date their reservations expired, and they ended up in Rapides Parish shelters because they have no homes, no jobs and no schools to go back to.
Then someone came up with the idea that they should leave the small shelters set up by the local churches and combine all into one building in a Pineville shopping center that used to be a Wal-Mart, rubbing shoulders with the new arrivals from the Superdome (200 of whom were personally brought in by Jesse Jackson in the middle of the night on Saturday). This scared the daylights out of these families, and many of the churches agreed that it wasn't safe. The small churches were told that they would lose their subsidy from the Red Cross if they didn't cooperate, but they seceded anyway and have continued to shelter these families at their own expense.
You can spot these people a mile away around town, because they're still managing to keep a decent personal appearance while paying with credit cards that are probably already maxed-out. They offer a sincere, sympathetic smile to everyone they see, assuming you're in the same boat with them. To be honest, I pray more for them than the people who were already in the welfare system before they got here. It's easier to empathize with them, sort of "the bigger they come, the harder they fall." As new shelters pop up in towns all over the country, I'm afraid these people -- the ones who were smart enough to get out of harm's way in the first place -- will be quickly overlooked and it's a shame.