In late December 2005, Haymarket People’s Fund sent a delegation to New Orleans to meet with local groups and get a first-hand look at the area, so we could assess how to leverage funding.

We were devastated by what we saw—the scale and toxicity of the flood damage is far greater than anything we had imagined. Rebuilding and clean-up is left to those who can leverage private resources. It is all too visible who has access to resources and who doesn’t. The federal government has apparently abandoned the African American communities of New Orleans.

We were shocked that the only federal personnel we saw were two Homeland Security agents protecting the levee. The only National Guard we saw were on crowd-control during New Year’s Eve in the French Quarter! All rebuilding and clean-up efforts were being carried out by families, local volunteer community organizations, or churches.

Take-Away Lessons

We learned that community organizing and community economic development must happen hand in hand. People will not return to New Orleans alone. With this in mind, local groups want to rebuild New Orleans neighborhood by neighborhood. Only when people return to the city will they be able to organize and become a strong political voice for appropriate development. But in order to return, people need to get support, information, and advocacy assistance in the cities they had to flee to. Local organizers are now working to create community centers in Jackson, Atlanta, Houston, and Baton Rouge—the major cities of the Katrina Diaspora.

Organizations Haymarket Supports

People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond, a 25-year-old community organization in New Orleans, is working to develop much needed community organizing centers. People’s Institute has staff and organizers in the cities of the diaspora to provide information, advocacy, mental health support, and coordination assistance. The community centers need to get up and running immediately and be functioning in the key cities within six months, at an expected cost of $500,000 per year for three years.

On the community economic development side, Citizens United for Economic Justice—a network of key business and organization leaders in New Orleans’ African American community— is creating a bridge loan fund for African American small businesses. The fund will work through existing community development financial institutions in the Gulf and with Liberty Bank. The network is also setting up small business centers to help entrepreneurs gain access to information, and providing support to help them rebuild their businesses.

Haymarket is reaching out for support of these community organizing and community development strategies. Funding these efforts early on in the process will solidify local communities’ ability to leverage their power at this critical moment. —T. Hollis Younger and P. Maher

The first institutional client of Walden, Haymarket People’s Fund provides funding for grassroots community groups in New England working for economic and social justice. For more information about these or other Haymarket initiatives contact Haymarket People’s Fund at (617) 522- 7676.