Katrina Corps

Every generation gets the chance to be part of something magnificent. Some people sign up. Others sign off. The Katrina Corps hopes you’ll choose to spend one week of your Spring Break ‘07 working your butt off helping the people of New Orleans. And having the time of your life.

WHAT IT IS. The Katrina Corps is a grass-roots citizen-sponsored effort calling 25,000 college students to New Orleans this Spring to do the grunt work required before existing flooded homes can be rebuilt. Many houses were under 8 feet of water for almost a month. To fix them, you first have to strip them inside, right down to the frame of the house. This is called “Gutting.”

To gut ONE house requires a team of 25 volunteers, an average of 6 hours of seriously dirty and back breaking work with hammers and wrecking bars. What’s weird is it’s one of the most fun and rewarding things a person can do. That’s a promise.

WHAT YOU’LL DO. Right now in New Orleans there are 10,000 families who have signed up for their homes to be gutted. The Katrina Corps, with your help, will cut that waiting list in half during March 5 through April 6. 5,000 houses gutted, by 5,000 students a week, in teams of 25, for each of the 5 weeks of Spring Break. Weekends and evenings will be for celebrating life in the Crescent City with bands being recruited from across the nation to help with this effort.

WHY YOU’RE NEEDED. Have you seen Bono’s “The Saints are Coming?” It shows what could have happened in New Orleans, but didn’t. Until you’ve seen it with your own eyes, you can’t imagine how much work there is to do. FEMA has money for hauling trash, but getting the trash and debris from the flooded houses out onto the street is hands-on, volunteer work. It’s Gutting. It has to be done. The Katrina Corps is volunteering. When the people who own the wrecked houses come to thank you with tears in their eyes, after you’ve put just about everything they own on the street, you know this is history making work. If nobody else will do it, we will.

WHO’LL BE WITH YOU. Your peers, from all over. Faculty and parents are also welcome. Colleges and Universities stagger their Spring Breaks. That’s why this is a 5-week effort. You’ll be with students from your school and others. Go recruit your friends! You’ll be joined by volunteer team leaders who have been part of gutting thousands of homes in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina hit in August 2005. This is a project “by the people, for the people.”

WHERE YOU’LL STAY. We need you to pre-register ASAP so we can provide housing for everyone on a super-fast timeline. Almost all of you will stay in hotel rooms in the City (multiple occupancy, $10 to $20/night max). These rooms will be underwritten as donations are received and in the order in which you pre-register. So pre-register NOW. Corporate and individual sponsors are also being lined up to cover all the other costs except for your registration fee, transportation to New Orleans, and your food most evenings. It’s possible some of you will stay in church dorms (they’ve been putting people up since Katrina.) If housing were easy, you wouldn’t be needed in New Orleans.

WHAT YOUR WORK DAY WILL BE Up at 7, breakfast, teams convene by 8, leave for the job site by 8:30. Gut until Noon with your team. Lunch. More gutting ’til around 3 or 4. Return to your base, shower, dinner. Then you’re off on your own until the next morning. Sleep is recommended at some point. We’ll have a schedule of planned entertainment once we know which bands are coming.

WHAT YOU’LL EAT. Breakfast will be provided at 7 am although it may be bagels, juice and coffee most mornings. Lunch also will be provided, on the job site. Throughout the day there’ll be snacks and fruit and lots of water. Dinner most nights will be on you, in the Culinary Capital of the United States.

WHAT YOU BRING.

• Work boots or thick-soled hiking boots. Nail proof.
• Jeans. Long sleeve shirts. The older the better—probably won’t be taking them home
• 10 Disposable air filtration masks, N-95 or better, with metal nose clips
• Tool belt (optional)
• 12-inch min. pry (”wrecking”) bar with nail claw
• Full-sized hammer
• Water bottle
• Sleeping bag (optional)

HOW YOU GET THERE. That’s up to you. If you’re close by, we suggest car pooling with your friends. If you’re flying, we’ll have transportation round the clock (you may have to wait a bit) or you can cab it. Directions will be coming. The more of you who can drive, the better, since we’ll need to get 5,000 of you to the various job sites every morning.

WHAT’S REQUIRED NOW. First, decide if you really want to work, because that’s what this is, hard and dirty. Then think about who you’d like to do it with and talk to them. If you can get your whole team of 25 together, so much the better. Then pre-register at www.katrinacorps.org and send in your $75 registration fee. Your place in this great effort will be assured. QUESTIONS? info@katrinacorps.org

The Katrina Corps Team is working with citizen volunteers, individual sponsors, and corporate sponsors to provide things each team will need such as trucks for every work site to bring the larger equipment, medical/safety, and administration. We’re already working with existing New Orleans gutting operations so we’re not inventing the wheel. We’re just asking your help to make that wheel a whole lot bigger in just 3 months.

WE CAN FIX THIS!

The theme of this entire effort comes from Muhammad Ali:

“IMPOSSIBLE IS NOTHING!”

SEE YOU IN NEW ORLEANS!