Trapped in New Orleans

From CounterPunch courtesy of the Socialist Worker, two radical EMS workers from San Francisco who were attending a conference in the Big Easy when Katrina hit relate the tale of their eventual escape:

Flush with the necessities, we offered food and water to passing families and individuals. Many decided to stay and join us. Our encampment grew to 80 or 90 people.

From a woman with a battery-powered radio, we learned that the media was talking about us. Up in full view on the freeway, every relief and news organizations saw us on their way into the city. Officials were being asked what they were going to do about all those families living up on the freeway. The officials responded that they were going to take care of us. Some of us got a sinking feeling. "Taking care of us" had an ominous tone to it.

Unfortunately, our sinking feeling (along with the sinking city) was accurate. Just as dusk set in, a sheriff showed up, jumped out of his patrol vehicle, aimed his gun at our faces and screamed, "Get off the fucking freeway." A helicopter arrived and used the wind from its blades to blow away our flimsy structures. As we retreated, the sheriff loaded up his truck with our food and water.

Once again, at gunpoint, we were forced off the freeway. All the law enforcement agencies appeared threatened when we congregated into groups of 20 or more. In every congregation of "victims," they saw "mob" or "riot." We felt safety in numbers. Our "we must stay together" attitude was impossible because the agencies would force us into small atomized groups.

In the pandemonium of having our camp raided and destroyed, we scattered once again. Reduced to a small group of eight people, in the dark, we sought refuge in an abandoned school bus, under the freeway on Cilo Street. We were hiding from possible criminal elements, but equally and definitely, we were hiding from the police and sheriffs with their martial law, curfew and shoot-to-kill policies.

Click here for the rest.

There's actually a six degrees and Kevin Bacon thing going on for me with this essay. Becky's friend Debbie from New Orleans who has been staying with us the past few days is originally from San Francisco and still has lots of contacts there. The above linked story was sent to me as a forwarded email, first sent by people who know the authors. Small world. It just goes to show how Katrina has affected the entire nation.

As far as the content of the story is concerned, which mostly explains how, in the absence of any official relief inside the city, people had to depend on each other but were continually thwarted by what little official presence there actually was, I think we're going to hear a lot in the coming weeks about how large numbers of evacuees have been treated like utter shit by officials at all levels of government. For crying out loud, earlier today I read about what amounts to a secluded detention center under heavy security in Oklahoma where "the occupants of the camp cannot leave the camp for any reason" for the next five months!!! Really, it's starting to look like last week's debacle was only Act I.

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