Home

I just spent a week in Waveland, Mississippi, which was ground zero for Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The city was virtually wiped off the map after losing over 90% of its properties, public and private. Three years later, the people are still rebuilding, still waiting, and feel like they have been forgotten.

Long after the cameras left, the debris of houses ripped apart, slab foundations, and twisted trees stand as harsh reminders of what took place. There are numerous businesses left untouched, roads unpaved, and homes no one can live in, but must pay a mortgage all the while. The people that live along the Gulf Coast need to know that they have not been forgotten. They are our friends and family regardless of how well we know them. The picture above is from the first post-Katrina trip I made to Pascagoula in 2006. There has been little improvement in the two years since then.

All I can compare it to is Hugo in 1989. I had just turned 11 when it made landfall in Charleston and trekked through the midlands before turning north towards Charlotte leaving a path of destruction. Hugo is what took Disaster Relief, as we know it, to the next level. My family would travel to Charleston every summer and it was like a second home to me. I still think it is one of the greatest cities in the world, but it needed help to recover. 19 years later you can still see the twisted trees that will never again be green, but their harshness is muted by those that survived and the new ones that have grown. I remember when our own state was hurting from Hugo. I remember when I saw Charleston for the first time after the storm and it was heartbreaking, even for an 11 year old boy who lived in the Upstate.

My hope for the Gulf Coasts of Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi is that they too will recover as Charleston has. I hope there will be a desire for people to continue to help in this devastated area and that there will be continued growing hope in the lives of people who feel depressed and lost wandering what to do. Our message for the people of Waveland was simple: We have not forgotten.