Monday, March 03, 2008

One House At A Time Update


"The recovery from Hurricane Katrina is far from the front pages these days. There were still 30,000 families (over 110,000 American individuals) still living in FEMA trailers earlier this month (feb 2008), when the "news" of deadly levels of formaldehyde in the trailers was finally reported.

I began filming this story one month after Katrina came ashore, and I recently returned to the devastated and impoverished town of Pearlington Mississippi. Even though its several miles from the actual coast, the storm surge and the wind brought this place to the brink of its very existence. The waves that came through this town and destroyed everything in their path first had to pass through a few Chemical Plants and Oil refineries out in the Gulf of Mexico. This was not merely sea water that carried these homes away, it was a deadly stew of unknown and unreported toxins.

This story follows the recovery efforts of one group that has been based in Pearlington as soon as the roads were clear enough to get in. One House At A Time is building homes for people of Pearlington who want to stay in the place where they call home. This video tells a little of their story, but anyone who has been there will tell you, there is no video that can be shot that can express the sort of devastation that has occurred on our own soil, to our own people. So go see it for yourself, and bring a hammer." -Kevin Leeser, March 2008
Link: One House At A Time project site
Link: This video on Current TV
Link: High-resolution Quicktime video

Previously on Operation Eden:
Hope, One House At A Time
Merry Christmas From Pearlington
Rebuilding Hope and Habitat

6 comments:

Judy Thorne said...

Wow. That brings tears to my eyes.

A world of thanks to One House at a Time and all of the volunteers that are dedicated to bringing this area back.

And thanks to YOU, Clayton for keeping the word out. People need to know that we're still not okay.

Jessa said...

Thank you. I live in Long Beach, MS and work in Pass Christian, MS and I am glad to see that people still care and are still willing to help out 2 and a half years later. The Gulf Coast encompasses a lot of towns and people, not just New Orleans.

Anonymous said...

the trailers are equal in formeldehyde to typical home communities being built in the US.
They are the same as any luxury car offgassing or any new home in the country.

What's more, America needs to catch up to Europe and build regs to formeldehyde. It causes cancer.

Anonymous said...

I have been following this from the first post. I just want to say that you have done a great job with the blog and I continue to spread the word about Operation Eden even today. Glad to see you are still updating it! I hope you will one day follow my suggestions on writing a book about this. Your pictures and stories need to be shared and put in a permanent medium, like a hard back book.

Anonymous said...

i love this blog! keep up good works...its to be nice if we can know each other, do you think so?

Anonymous said...

That incident was so bad.I was shocked when i heard that news about katrina in South America and other regions of America.You are doing great job by making a film on that incident.I really appreciate that.
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