Wolfe aids Katrina victims

By Stephany Roden
Trail Sports Editor

Northwest College Psychology Professor Wally Wolfe devoted his time and energy to help the Hurricane Katrina victims. Wolfe recently returned from 17 days in neighborhoods in and around the New Orleans area. The Red Cross recruited him to assist in crisis intervention for hurricane victims due to a shortage of mental health workers. So Wolfe flew to Baton Rouge. The team would find the people hurting the most and talk with them.

Whether is was helping people who were stressed out or helping those who couldn’t take their medications because they couldn’t get them, Wolfe and fellow Red Cross members found ways to help them.

On a typical day the team would talk to 200-300 people a day. Out of that group, they would pick out the ones that were really hurting and take 30 minutes to sit down and just talk with them.

“We would drive around the neighborhoods and stop at the homes of the victims who were moving back in and help them deal with the shock of seeing their homes gone and just listen to them,” said Wolfe.
Wolfe and the rest of his team were only working with temporary fixes, so they referred victims to see another member of the Red Cross for further assistance. It was also their job to take care of the other Red Cross members, some 40,000 from all over the country who had stress due to unfamiliar jobs, having to live in shelters and sometimes dealing with no running water. The team’s filled SUVs with ready to eat meals, water, gloves and face masks to keep the victims from coming in contact with mold growing in and around their homes.
In those 17 days, Wolfe visited five neighborhoods surrounding New Orleans – Algiers, French Quarter, Belle Chasse, St. Bernard Parish and the Ninth Ward. “Algiers wasn’t as bad as some areas, but the Ninth Ward was the hardest hit area,” said Wolfe.

Each area had its own problems, but one thing they all had in common was nothing worked. The electricity started working six weeks after the hurricane and the victims were allowed to return to their homes. This is when the team really stepped in by providing the basic necessities such as food, cleaning products and over-the-counter medicines if they didn’t have them. The team fed both the victims and the construction workers. “They couldn’t go to a restaurant and there were no grocery stores open,” said Wolfe.

French Quarter and Belle Chasse were the next two stops for Wolfe. Here they found the same things, people returning to their homes devastated at what they saw. In Belle Chasse the major source of living was fishing. This caused the people of Belle Chasse hardships because not only did they have to worry about losing their homes but also losing their boats.

Wolfe said that St. Bernard Parish was more of a suburban and middle-class area. These people’s homes were completely covered by water and mud. The families had to take everything out and pile it in front of the homes. Wolfe said that it looked like a graveyard, seeing all of the refrigerators lined up out on the lawns.

The last area Wolfe and his team visited was the Ninth Ward. This was the hardest hit area, populated mainly by lower income African Americans. This was the only part of town the African Americans could own homes. These homes were so small that the floodwaters completely submerged them for weeks. These victims did not have anything to come back to and for some neighborhoods families were not allowed in because the Red Cross was still finding bodies.

“The first day four bodies were found and we still were finding more,” added Wolfe.
Devoting time and energy brought both physical and emotional hardships. The physical part for Wolfe was being on his feet for 10 hours a day walking around and talking to the people.

There was also some emotional strain on him. “Dealing with people under great amounts of stress puts more stress on yourself.” Wolfe said that the first thing to do is take care of yourself, then you take care of the other volunteers and then you can take care of the actual victims. “If you can not take care of yourself, you are useless to the ones you are trying to help,” said Wolfe.