August 29, 2007
Katrina Anniversary Raises Questions About Priorities
The second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina has prompted questions from nonprofit officials about America’s priorities.
Larry James, a former New Orleans resident who oversees a Central Dallas Ministries, a charity that helps the poor, writes on Larry James’ Urban Daily that the U.S. government has abandoned one of its major cities.
Mr. James writes that he is sickened by the nation’s inability to mount a coordinated effort to rebuild New Orleans.
“I wonder what our reaction might be if New Orleans had been destroyed by an act of foreign terror? I have this feeling more would be under way today and I think I know who would be in charge,” he writes.
“But those in charge in Washington right now evidently don’t believe the federal government can solve the problem or lead us toward a better day in a city in need of coordinated national attention. Movie stars and entertainers are more concerned about the city than our national leaders.”
But not all of the blame is being foisted on the government.
Trent Stamp. president of Charity Navigator, uses the philanthropic efforts surrounding Hurricane Katrina to point out just how much money Americans throw at major nonprofit institutions — and how little they give to support causes like the Katrina rebuilding effort.
“Harvard’s endowment is now $35-billion. It grew by $6-billion last year alone,” Mr. Stamp writes on Trent Stamp’s Take. “Coincidentally, $6-billion is how much was given by all the charities in the world to Hurricane Katrina relief. This amount, equivalent to what Harvard’s endowment grew in one year, was the largest one-time philanthropic outlay in the history of the world.”
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The Constitution gives no authority to the federal government to provide disaster relief. Like many other federal “responsibilities,” this one comes from the progressivist era when the notion became dominant that anything wrong in the country (or the world, for that matter) could be, and should be, “fixed” by the federal government.
That “fixing” comes at a high price. Just recently, we learned that over the last few decades the feds have spent $11 trillion – that’s trillion with a “t” – on ending poverty. And the rate of poverty is still about what it was 40 years ago.
Federal money comes from taxpayers. All Americans do not owe it to the much smaller number of Americans who choose to live in an ecologically unsound, disaster prone area such as New Orleans to bail them out (literally) now that mother nature has done her worst.
As Stamp noted, we’ve already seen the largest one-time outlay in history through private giving to Katrina Relief. Let the private sector handle it. The feds aren’t authorized to handle it and as the $11 trillion to end poverty as well as immediate performance after Katrina demonstrates, the feds aren’t competent to handle it, either.
— Sam Davis Aug 29, 02:59 PM #
That $11 trillion demonstrably raised millions of families out of poverty over the course of those few decades. It’s just that other policies—like a minimum wage that steadily declined in value—hurt enough other people to keep the percentage in poverty high.
— Dennis Fischman Aug 29, 03:18 PM #
Well said, Sam.
I would also like to point out that New Orleans was not the only place on the Gulf Coast that got hit by Katrina. But no one seems concerned about helping Biloxi, MS for example. Is that because the people in MS aren’t complaining, but just got to work themselves?
Federal money (or lack thereof) is clearly not the problem…
— Becky Aug 29, 05:25 PM #
Sam, how can you possibly claim that the federal government should not be involved in the response to this catastrophe?!? This is not about welfare. This is about undoing the destruction of one of America’s greatest national treasures.
Would you argue that the federal government should not have been involved in cleaning up NYC in the wake of 9/11?
This is no different.
It’s just that it mostly affects poor, black citizens.
This is not about charity. It’s about justice. We should demand that our country invest in the redevelopment of New Orleans.
— Jeremy Gregg Sep 1, 01:19 PM #