Jewish Family Service of San Diego Katrina Aid
JFS
Hurricane Katrina
On August 1, 2007, we closed our official Hurricane Katrina program after two years of serving clients in the wake of this disaster. Please contact our intake line at (877) 537-1818 for existing programs that can still assist clients affected by Hurricane Katrina.
A phone call from David Perez, a Carmel Valley Businessman, pleading for help for one family who were victims of Hurricane Katrina, ignited Jewish Family Service of San Diego. The subsequent meeting between Perez, Jill Spitzer, Chief Executive Officer of JFSSD and Linda Hutkin-Slade, Senior Director of Counseling and Case Management Services, began the quest to help all 1,209 evacuees to San Diego. An alliance created during the San Diego October Wildfires of 2003 spearheaded by District 4 Councilman Tony Young and the Reverend Eric Miller of St. Stephen Interdenominational Alliance, turned into the Unmet Needs committee. Together with the American Red Cross, Catholic Charities, Episcopal Community Services, Interfaith Community Services, JFS, the Salvation Army, Neighborhood House and the Urban League, the committee reconvened to facilitate the effort. Over one million people were displaced as the result of Katrina and later Hurricane Rita and as of November 10, 2005, there were 2,378 evacuees in San Diego.
The Unmet Needs Committee accepted large donations including one from Barona Casino raised by employees, Barona Valley Ranch, and Barona Band of Mission Indians. Boulder Oaks Elementary School in Alpine, themselves victims of the 2003 Wildfires, mounted a fundraiser called “Coins for Katrina” successfully collecting over $2,700 in cash and $660 in gift cards.
The Chatman family from Baton Rouge is one of the many success stories. The couple and their two children left New Orleans the day before Katrina hit with just the clothes on their backs and a small bag of belongings. JFS helped the family to relocate to an apartment in Poway, register the kids in new schools and helped the parents find new jobs. They were one of the families that benefited from the Boulder Oaks School Fundraiser and were invited to attend the school’s Spirit Assembly where they thanked the kids for their generosity.
JFS specifically provided case management services to 170 individuals, reunited 51 people with their relatives outside of San Diego, provided ongoing assistance to 70 individuals who relocated to San Diego, facilitated car donations and transportation for evacuees, and continued to receive and help 8-12 new evacuee families for months after the initial arrival.
After the initial crisis passed, San Diego’s social service agencies struggled with problems created by the culture shock and the cost of living that these refugees were unaccustomed to. In addition, most evacuees expected to be able to return home, were not skilled workers, and were experiencing post traumatic stress.
We aid and monitor the families that we have helped and will continue to do so for at least a full year. United Jewish Federation has generously funded our case manager for the first six months and we will need to find funding for the additional six months.
These hurricane disasters have been a wake up call to our community for creating working disaster preparedness plans for all service organizations. The nationwide rollout of “2-1-1″ telephone referral service created by United Way of America and its affiliates which links callers to social services and volunteers in their communities is just the beginning. JFS is working on our own disaster recovery plan that will unite our nine offices and prepare us to be able to respond to local and regional disasters.
For more information, call (877) 537-1818 or e-mail webmaster@jfssd.org
March 11, 2009 at 4:04 pm
These are tremendous accomplishments — Thank you JFS, David Perez and 2 Life 18 Help and Rescue!