reminds me of the SNL chick.:)
Posted on 05/30/2007 12:21:03 PM PDT by TornadoAlley3
HOUSTON -- Nineteen months after Hurricane Katrina sent evacuees from New Orleans streaming into Houston, more than 5,000 heads of households among them are still unemployed despite the city's booming economy, officials say.
The number of jobless is contributing to the sense among some Houston-area residents that the storm's victims are a drain on the city and have worn out their welcome.
After the storm, a quarter-million evacuees were brought to Houston, welcomed by Mayor Bill White, who threw open the Astrodome. Even before the storm, many were desperately poor, unemployed and on welfare or food stamps.
Many had been holding out hope that they would be home in New Orleans by now, but the city's rebuilding has been painfully slow, and about 100,000 are still here. They have settled in more or less permanently, some still on food stamps.
About 12,000 families are still getting federal aid for housing, the city said. Of that group, about 5,500 heads of households are unemployed, not counting those who are elderly and disabled, city officials said.
Houston's economy is hot because of the booming oil and gas industry. City officials say there are 2 million job openings, 59,000 of which require only a high school education. Houston's unemployment rate is 3.8 percent, versus 4.5 percent nationally.
The mayor - who was recently given the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award, bestowed on politicians who risk their popularity to do what they regard as the right thing - defended the evacuees, saying: "I don't think most people want to live in trailer cities or shelters. They want to get on with their lives."
But Republican Rep. John Culberson said the evacuees should have benefits cut off if they don't get a job.
"We're a charitable nation and Houston in particular has a big heart, and we have already gone way above and beyond the call of duty to help our neighbors," Culberson said. "It's time for everyone who can work to get to work."
Sixty-five percent of Houstonians surveyed earlier this year by Rice University said the influx of evacuees has been a "bad thing" for their city. And some blame the new residents for a surge in violent crime. The number of homicides jumped from 275 in 2004 to 376 in 2006.
Harris County Commissioner Steve Radack said the government should be doing more to help evacuees find jobs, transportation and child care.
"For the taxpayers that are out there working, it's an insult that their federal taxes are going toward paying people who aren't working," he said. "It's outrageous."
The government already is offering considerable help. FEMA-paid housing has been extended to 2009 and federal officials will move an evacuee closer to a job. Thirty hours of work a week earns an evacuee free child care.
The city Community Settlement Task Force Network has spent $1.9 million since October offering resume help, free interview-appropriate clothes, job fairs, financial workshops, free food for children, computer classes, even hurricane-preparedness workshops. The money comes from $550 million in federal social-services grants that Congress authorized for all Katrina evacuees.
Some evacuees say they did not know such help was available. And even with help, evacuees say there are still many obstacles to landing a job.
"Transportation is a huge problem. Child care is a huge problem. Thinking that they were not sure they were staying in Houston was a huge problem," said Cindy Gabriel, a spokeswoman for the task force.
Houston is sprawling metropolitan area, with a web of highways; New Orleans is more compact, and many residents there relied on public transportation - something not always available in their new city. Also, some single mothers are separated from members of their extended family and can no longer rely on them for child care.
Odessa Jarreau, 61, said that just being an evacuee is making it harder to find a job.
"Once we put in the applications and they see the Louisiana connection, they don't even consider it. We don't even get calls back," she said. "It drains you, you know? You feel like you're not worth anything."
Before the storm, Jarreau was a parking supervisor at the Superdome. But comparable jobs in Houston require being outside, she said, which Jarreau cannot do because of her high blood pressure.
Jarreau said that after more than a year, her daily routine of making calls to employment agencies and employers, attending job fairs and walking around her neighborhood in search for wanted signs has yielded nothing.
A potential job with AARP did not pan out because it would have required a bus trip of several hours to get to work. Calls to a school district to offer her services as a bus aide or cafeteria worker were never returned, she said. She failed the test to get a job cleaning airplanes.
They don’t want to work. Heck we’ve been taking care of them their whole lives why should they start working now.
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45 Years on the Federal Plantation - the Long Term Effects of Direct Deposit
Sep 3, 2005
As I watched the remorseful scenes unfold in and around the Superdome, my mind wandered to the civilian victims of WWII. Countless millions were displaced by the horrors of colliding armies.
Probably because I was born shortly after WWII started, I've always had a keen interest in the war from an historical aspect. I've watched quite a number of videos and movies concerning almost every major campaign.
Invariably, the film maker includes scenes of displaced civilians and the suffering they endured. One favorite scene included in probably half of the movies I've seen, shows a long line of civilians trudging single file down a narrow road in the country. Up above, Nazi pilots see them and swoop down to strafe the fleeing civilians, spraying the column with machine gun bullets.
Once the attackers had satisfied their thirst for blood, the civilians climbed out of the protective ditches on either side of the road. They brushed themselves off, collected their meager belongings, and once again began their march to safety, which brings me to my point.
Do the people at the Superdome lack the basic instincts for survival?
Most say they have lost everything. What is preventing them from picking up their lawn chairs and walking out of New Orleans?
Surely, there is a way out. Otherwise, how did the myriad of reporters get there with all of the heavy equipment required to beam the tragic scenes to us?
Why not use highway 610 and walk right out of New Orleans?
From numerous personal visits, I know that it's not a great distance to Kenner. My maps indicate it's somewhere around 10 miles.
What's at Kenner? Well for one thing, the New Orleans airport is at Kenner. Certainly the local airport has to be the logical place to go when you're in need of emergency supplies.
Why are these people stuck at the Superdome?
I repeat, do they lack the ability to react to their basic survival instincts?
My conclusion is that they do. They have lost the ability to think for themselves and respond to their basic instincts.
Instead, they remain in an untenable situation and make desperate pleas to television audiences throughout the world.
How could this be?
Here's what I think. These people have been on the "Federal Plantation" for generations. They subsist on their monthly "gubment check." They are the product of 40 plus years of depending upon the government for their very existence. So, when they are put in situation where the government can't tell them what to do, they are lost. Worse than that, they have lost the ability to think for themselves. They have lost the ability to react to their basic survival instincts. They cannot get out of the ditch and continue their march to safety after Katrina has strafed them.
Furthermore, they are not a community. They are a mass of anonymous humans each fighting for a chance to suckle at the government breasts. How else can you explain six murders and 12 rapes in the Superdome while Katrina was roaring? The perpetrators had to view their victims as strangers, members of another tribe, to justify their assaults.
A really horrifying thought is that this lack of initiative, the inability to think and take action, permeates the political infrastructure of Louisiana. I cannot think of a more inept pair of "leaders" than New Orleans Mayor Nagin and Louisiana Governor Blanco.
Mayor Nagin in a public display of incompetence, admitted on CNN cameras that he "doesn't know whose problem this is" when questioned about disaster relief response. I can tell you Mayor Nagin, it's your problem. However, your many years of taking orders from the political machinery that runs the State of Louisiana has left you without the ability to think for yourself and make the necessary preparations for eventual disasters.
Mayor Nagin you were warned repeatedly that there was a 20 foot tidal surge on the way. You knew that the levies most likely would not hold up against the surge. What plans did you make to protect your constituents in the event flooding took place? Apparently, you had none.
And Governor Blanco, you are in control of the National Guard. Contrary to the main stream media's insinuations that President Bush should have called up the National Guard, you are the one who could have staged Louisiana Guard units in Baton Rouge, or Alexandria, prior to the storm. You are the Commander in Chief of the Louisiana National Guard. You are the one responsible for the proper use of the National Guard during times of disaster.
Having spent six years in the Texas Army National Guard, I'm surprised that any Guard units are in New Orleans. It generally takes at least 48 hours just to mobilize a unit; that is get everyone to show up at the Armory. It takes another 48 hours to load the trucks with equipment and various gear. Then you have the march, the actual movement of the unit to the theatre of operations.
Meanwhile, refugees are filling up sports arenas, the convention center, etc throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. The constant barrage of new reports leads us to believe that these people will be productive members of our community. They just need a little help getting started again, after their misfortune.
Of course, this is a lie. By and large, these people will simply move into one of the government projects when they are forced to leave their temporary arrangements. They won't add to the economy, because they don't work. They will simply make the crowded projects even more crowded and increase the crime rate.
After all, you don't even have to go to the mail box to get your "gubment check." They can direct deposit it right into your account.
There are too many experienced drug dealers from N.O., why would they want some deadbeat job?
I've noticed that too! First, when we lived in the Galleria, thuggy folks would wander around, scoping things out. I am always riding my mtn bike, and I'd make eye contact with them, then loop around the block and make eye contact again, to let them know they were surveilled.
Also, there is a mini-crime wave in the parking lot of the Kroger's at Westpark and Buffalo Speedway. Cars are getting broken into, and old people are getting beat as they are robbed there. I live next door, and from my balcony I can see them (thugs, not old people!) meander though the lot, looking into cars and poking around the backside of the Krogers.
I'm like, WTF?
I've never known that casing out cars was acceptable behavior. I am half a mind to apply for a concealed carry permit, but I'm a tad rash.
Same way Gore failed divinity school. Just STUPID I guess
They don’t have jobs because they receive my and your tax dollars to support their lifestyle. I live here, see it daily. I was never approached before by people in parking lots begging for money, our local welfare office never had lines outside. You obviously don’t live in Houston, and their actions DO make it my personal business. I have concealed carry, but my wife does not and won’t get it. STFU
Someone, anyone tell me how you can fail a job application cleaning airplanes. The only possiblity I can think of is that you don’t know what an airplane is or you can’t find the airport on a map.
“I am sitting at the bar at the beach house pool working amid a myriad of distractions including keeping an eye on this site.”
Really successful, it sounds like. Of course, on the internet, no one knows you’re a dog. (just a thought from my 130th floor penthouse, writing 7 figure checks to the taxman...)
>>>>I repeat: whether they have a job or not is their business. Transfer form your pocket to theirs should not take place PERIOD. Their situation is none of your business.<<<<
Fact is that transfer IS coming out of our pockets into theirs, therefore it IS our business.
What don’t you understand?
...and smoking crack.
If you mean that you are a tad rash about taking action and threatening people, by all means, do not get a concealed carry permit.
But, if you are concerned for your safety, and can learn to control yourself rationally (it sounds so from your post), by all means, get a concealed carry permit, study the legal aspects of the use of deadly force, and help us all be a little safer.
reminds me of the SNL chick.:)
LOL... I bet you're right.
I was thinking the test was probably to put her on a ‘dirty’ plane and telling her to clean up. She turns to the instructor and says, “Clean what up? It looks fine to me”.
Good post!
I wonder how many of those who had their guns confiscated have gotten their guns back.
The 100,000 is the head count. 5,500 refers to heads of households.
So if a head of household is supporting 1 - 2 other people, that would account for 11,000 - 16,500 of the 100,000.
A better comparison would be to find out how many of the 100,000 are heads of households and compute the unemployment percentage based on that number.
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