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And as time goes on, complaints about the ARC continue to pile up. They were a pain to work with during Ivan and have been placed under investigation (and some people possible indictment) for mismanagement of funds and resources during the relief effort.

Article published Sep 4, 2005 Red Cross bureaucracy causing frustrations

By Billy Gunn bgunn@thetowntalk.com (318) 487-6378
It's been a week since Hurricane Katrina evacuees started arriving, dazed and heartbroken, fearing for loved ones and what the future holds. Many escaped with little clothing, their kids and pets in tow, not much money in their pockets, jobs vanquished.

They grew roots quickly wherever in Cenla they landed: small churches and campgrounds, at least one hotel that let them live in lobbies and fed them.

It was the closest thing to home they've had, and Central Louisiana welcomed them with bountiful generosity.

However, some of the refugees and those who have helped them are frustrated with the Red Cross and its intractable bureaucracy, its tendency to look to the rule book before taking a step, whether it be registering evacuees for shelters and getting help from sorely needed volunteers.

Also, the Red Cross-mandated migrating of evacuees from small shelters to large is ripping some from the small venues where they feel safe to much larger ones where people are placed hundreds to a room with no privacy and a shortage of bathrooms.

Leann Murphy, CEO of the American Red Cross of Central Louisiana, said her agency is in "crisis mode," they're doing the best they can and that she understands the frustrations of evacuees and volunteers alike.

Just walk in the Red Cross' command central on Jackson Street, and one encounters a house almost mad: volunteers dodging each other, cellular phones' different tones sing, a closed door for a much-needed private moment.

But the enormity of the crisis, the influx of refugees (on Saturday the number at approved Red Cross shelters in Central Louisiana was 6,000, with thousands more staying elsewhere), doesn't seem to bring a change in Red Cross procedures.

'Ridiculous'
"The Red Cross, they are ridiculous," said Tim Murry, a manager at Alexandria's Holiday Inn Convention Center, where 100 to 200 evacuees have lived since Katrina's landfall.

The hotel, like many other places with no Red Cross assistance, has sheltered and fed the southeastern Louisiana residents, or former residents, since they arrived: some yesterday, some a week ago.

Murry said he and Raj Patel, whose family owns the inn, on Friday tried to get the temporary tenants registered with the Red Cross but were met with resistance because of the emergency agency's steadfast adherence to its rules.

Before registering, the hotel would have to demand that evacuees leave, then they'd have to find a registration center and fill out a form supplied by a certified Red Cross volunteer, Murry said.

As a compromise, Murry and Patel offered to bring registration forms to the hotel and have evacuees fill them out there to keep their tenants, many of whom have not a buck for gasoline, off the road.

And, they said, the Alexandria Riverfront Center is connected to the Holiday Inn, just steps away.

The Riverfront is one of four big Red Cross shelters in Rapides Parish that continues to take on evacuees; two busloads of New Orleans evacuees arrived Friday night.

But those staying at the Holiday Inn, where in banquet rooms they've made makeshift beds out of chairs, couldn't walk up stairs and register, Murry said.

"I just said screw it. I'm keeping them," Patel said. "The important thing is that they register with FEMA."

FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is a critical link to those displaced and needing federal assistance.

Evacuees at the Holiday Inn said Red Cross volunteers did come and tell them about the procedures and what the agency required.

It wasn't a good exchange, said those who've constructed boundaries where families can keep a semblance of privacy in the inn's banquet room.

The Red Cross volunteer "came barging in here and said that we're destructing the hotel," said Christina Rosa of Metairie, who didn't remember the volunteer's name. "They said the hotel does not want you."

"We had problems with the Red Cross being kinda rude to us," said Sharon Sam of New Orleans.

Both women said the generosity of Central Louisiana and especially Patel and the Holiday Inn staff was a godsend: all were fed, local pastors came by to see check on them, local Salvation Army volunteers supplemented their needs, they felt safe.

But, Marco Sosa said, "This changed a lot of people's mind about the Red Cross."

Riverfront Center
In the Riverfront Center, hundreds lay on cots and milled around in the over-cooled complex Saturday, and Marion Smith missed the smaller confines of Northwood Elementary, where she and other St. Bernard Parish evacuees had stayed. "I loved it there," she said. "It's so crowded here."

Then Cynthia Jate, who drove the St. Bernard bus passengers to safety, told Smith, "I got hold of your son. Pack your bags, he's coming (from Houston) to get you."

Stunned and teary, Smith said nothing, just listened.

"He said he's been to Marksville to Mississippi, Lafayette, lookin' for you," Jate said. "He's so tickled."

Jate told other St. Bernard residents "anything's better than here. You don't know these people.

"All the St. Bernard people, I'm trying to get them out," said Jate, clearly in charge.

A volunteer
Leatha Basco also is mad at the Red Cross. Though disabled, she thought she could do something, anything, for refugees pouring in from the southeastern part of the state.

So, she left Forest Hill Friday morning and drove to the Rapides Parish Coliseum's Exhibition Hall, one of the big-venue Red Cross shelters, the one landmark she knew how to get to.

She put in a couple of hours, cleaning the restrooms and helping by lending her cellular phones to refugees desperate to find loved ones and wanting news on their homes.

Basco then attended training, where "they said that if you can't put in eight, 12, 24 hours (at a time), they don't want you. I just got up and walked out."

"There's a lot of people out there that give a little time," she said. "I guess I'm good enough to clean the toilet but not good enough for anything else."

Murphy, the Red Cross CEO, said her manpower resources are stretched thin, and that might deviate from agency rules and let volunteers work shorter hours.

The minimum-hours rule, she said, is in place for more orderly scheduling.

Town Talk reporter Mandy Goodnight contributed to this article.

I've stayed at the H.I. in Alexandria before, and attended a conference there in July. Nice of Patel to do that. You walk outside or take the escalator up and your are in the conference center. There is a hotel, Bently I think, that closed not to long ago. Im sure they have about 100 rooms in there that could be utilized.

Speaking of the Red Cross. Hate to kick a fella when he's down, but. I went to the Reunion Arena today to volunteer. No one was in charge and no one knew what they were doing. They just tried their best to look cool in their RC vests.

You fill out an application, go through a one day training course, background check, than they put you on a list to help. I am sending them money only because my company is matching what we donate.

Before registering, the hotel would have to demand that evacuees leave, then they'd have to find a registration center and fill out a form supplied by a certified Red Cross volunteer, Murry said.

It is this sort of crap that makes me an unholy terror in every meeting with every bureaucrat at every place I work. It's finally come to the point that they acquiese just so I'll shut up.

Not optimal, but I'm okay with it.

How bout dem Saints?
Man the traffic has gotten really crowded in quiet little Alexandria. I'm out in the sticks, and dread going into town now. It's like Christmas Time traffic all day long now.

We need more LEOs to handle the extra big city citizenry. The hospitals are gettin full up too.

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