The Disaster Relief Committee at Patterson organized 3
meetings this past Memorial Day, Monday September 5,
2005. The meetings were held in Lake Charles, Louisiana;
Bossier City, Louisiana; and Ball, Louisiana. Over 1,200
elders were in attendance from Louisiana, Missouri,
Arkansas, and Texas. I took horrible notes, but want to
share a few things.
The elder opening the meeting emphasized the
importance of confidentiality. All cell phones were to
be turned off, except their's in case they received a
call from Patterson. Confidentiality was stressed, they
don't want family members or publishers to know the
details of this meeting. WTS will release reports later
through the proper channel.
WTS Disaster Relief called the meeting to inform local
elders of what the current situation is and what will be
happening in the future.
8 Regional Building Committees (RBCs) are working
together as a Hurricane Katrina Relief Committee (HKRC).
Patterson is in contact with this group at least twice a
day every day planning and organizing.
Day one after the hurricane a few brothers from the HKRC
went into New Orleans/Slidell area and began assessing
damage to Kingdom Halls. The elders divided parts of
southeast Louisiana into zones, my notes are sketchy and
memory missing a few points, but in one zone 5 KHs are
gone, 2 heavily damaged. Around Lake Pontchartrain 7 KHs
are gone, 7 moderate damage, and some with light damage.
On day two the brothers did more assessments, but
martial law was put in place and they had to leave.
The elder handling one of the parts was very critical
of Red Cross. He said the HKRC was going into shelters
in Louisiana and Mississippi to identify and get JWs
out. At Red Cross shelters they encountered problems,
Red Cross officials wouldn't let them in. The brother
said Red Cross gets money for every person they shelter
so they didn't want JWs leaving the shelter. The elders
dressed as if they were evacuees in order to gain
entrance into the shelters and then once inside they put
on their district convention lapel badges and walked
around the shelters. The elder was very proud of this
deception, and several elders in attendance seemed
satisfied with the ploy. All of the JWs that were in
shelters are now in JW homes. There are 3,000 - 4,000
displaced JWs, there are 8 missing from New Orleans.
Patterson wants elders to get the name and home
congregation of displaced JWs that begin attending KHs
in new locations. This point was stressed. My thoughts
are that WTS can't afford to let any JWs use this as an
opportunity to fade or stop attending meetings. From the
way the point was made to get publisher information and
report it to WTS, methinks they are more concerned with
losing members than members' welfare.
100% of Spanish JWs are accounted for because they were
at their district convention, while only 90% of English
JWs are accounted for...no doubt because they weren't at
their convention. I don't see how those percentages
match up to the numbers of missing they gave. Again, I
think they are just trying to use this as another means
to guilt people into going to the meetings and
assemblies/conventions.
WTS says this is the biggest thing they have had to
deal with. They need the cooperation of all
congregations for Jehovah's glory. The HKRC will
organize 40 departments working out of Kenner and
Metairie. Patterson has a Communication Center setup in
Tulane and 5 satellite offices (30-35 people per office)
around the gulf area. These 40 departments will have a
total staff of 500 personnel. There is a wireless
computer hub being setup in Houston. At this hub, they
are developing software just for Katrina relief, and
they also have a dedicated line to Patterson. When
construction begins on KHs and JW homes there will be
approximately 5,000 - 7,000 construction volunteers
used. No mention of where these volunteers will come
from. My guess is perhaps workers from KH construction
and Branch construction.
They concluded by telling us to prepare, offer, and wait
for direction. They repeated getting names and
congregation info of displaced JWs. And they told us to
tell know one of the details of the meeting, and reports
will be released through the proper channel.
And so there you have it.