Katrina Aid and Relief Effort (KARE)
Steven G. Rogelberg
University of North Carolina Charlotte
August 29, 2005 is a day that residents of Louisiana, Mississippi, the region, and the nation will long remember. The monster Katrina stormed ashore, claiming more than 1,380 lives and wreaking unfathomable destruction. It was our tsunami.
On September 3, 2005 SIOP formed a committee called KARE (Katrina Aid and Relief Effort). The goals of the committee were to support and assist (a) SIOP members and affiliates (e.g., graduate students) who have been directly affected by Katrina, (b) first responders, and (c) businesses, workers, and workplaces damaged or devastated by this disaster.
The committee is chaired by Steven Rogelberg and composed of a group of kind, caring, and very competent individuals:
Alan Davidson ( Davidson Training and Consulting), Jim Diefendorff (University of Colorado Denver),
John Fennig (DRI Consulting), Leaetta Hough (The Dunnette Group, Ltd.),
Donald Truxillo (Portland State University), and Vicki Vandaveer (Vandaveer Group). The group has been very ably supported by the SIOP office. Most notably, Dave Nershi has worked well beyond the call of duty to facilitate our efforts.
This is a report of our efforts to dateand a reminder to all that we are here and remain ready to help in whatever ways we can as people seek to rebuild their businesses, practices, careers, and/or research.
The first task of the committee was to figure out exactly how to address our helping goals in the face of not having any proactive disaster response plan. Our initial plan was created on the fly and was fluidzigging and zagging on a weekly basis. I will outline below the actions completed by the committee to date (not necessarily in order of their implementation).
1. Informed the SIOP membership about the committee.
2. Started assembling a dataset of e-mail addressees of those SIOP members and affiliates in the affected regions. Given that a number of university servers were out, many affected members created new e-mail addresses (e.g., hotmail). Tracking these down was laborious and in a number of cases unsuccessful.
3. Sent an e-mail message to our affected members and affiliates communicating a message of support and a desire to assist them in their personal and professional needs.
4. Received a large number of e-mails from our affected members and affiliates. Most just thanked us for taking an interest and expressed appreciation that their society cared. For a number of people we were able to provide some level of helpprimarily providing information regarding critical resources and information on the whereabouts of others. In a few cases we worked with Blackwell and Sage Publishing to help rebuild destroyed personal libraries.
5. Contacted other organizations and groups (e.g., APA, APA divisions, APS), attempting to coordinate efforts. We then (and continue to do so) teamed up with APA Division 13 (Society of Consulting Psychology, SCP) to further develop and expand the outreach efforts.
6. Created a Web site presence, with the following functions:
a. Informationimportant resources and contact numbers
b. Help resourcesa help and response center that serves to match individuals offering help with those in need.
c. Communications centerwhere people can post messages to affected individuals and vice versa.
d. Outreach centerwhich identifies helping opportunities I-O psychologists could lend their services to. (For example, we made our members aware of an opportunity to assist with career guidance effort in Texas, which at least one member helped with). The Web site has had over 2,000 hits.
7. After informing the SIOP membership about the Web site, we received nearly a hundred e-mails offering pro bono consulting help, internship opportunities, housing assistance, and office space.
8. Created a national press release to make displaced workers and affected organizations aware of SIOP and SCP and the volunteers who are willing to assist them.
A number of actions are currently underway. They include:
1. Communicating with the SPCA (Society for the Prevention of the Cruelty to Animals) of New Orleans regarding how we might help them.
2. Staying in close contact with our ground contacts, City of New Orleans, and so on, ready to respond as needs are identified.
3. Submitted a proposal to APA to have a presence at the convention in New Orleansa MASH-type KARE tent, where well provide triage, on-site, and referral connections.
As you can see, our Society is actively involved in meaningful efforts to help Katrina victims. Furthermore, more potential helping efforts are on the horizon. This is where we need your help. We are still looking for volunteers who are willing to assist in some way to help organizations get back on their feet (e.g., selection, training, OD, etc.). If interested please visit our Web site
(http://www.siop.org/KAREOnline/main.aspx) and post your offer of help.
Now that we have the infrastructure in place, and 6 months of experience in how to do this, we feel more prepared to quickly respond to future disasters that may affect our members and/or businesses and institutions.
April 2006 Table
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