Free Republic

Darryl Delatte, 57 years old and 22 months shy of retiring as a mechanic, was rescued from his flooded New Orleans home after Hurricane Katrina and dropped on an interstate. There, he watched people die -- and wondered why no help came. "Everybody kept passing you by," he says. Now, at a cavernous disaster relief center in Houston, he ponders the promises made by government officials -- of land and jobs for evacuees back home, of a rebirth of the city's essential, vibrant black community.