Habitat Needs Help

This is where all of my editorial-style notes go and I can NOT let this go without saying something.
The article:
Habitat for Humanity Seeks More Gulf Coast Helpers
Group sets a goal of 1,000 homes by 2007
By The Associated Press
Thu, Jul. 20 2006 09:31 AM EST

AMERICUS, Ga. (AP) - Habitat for Humanity International is appealing for more volunteers to help build homes for families left homeless when hurricanes Katrina and Rita ravaged the Gulf Coast last year.
(Photo Caption Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee drives a nail and his wife Janet Huckabee, left, looks on at the Habitat for Humanity Musicians' Village in New Orleans on Saturday, July 15, 2006. On Saturday, some of the member governors in town for the Southern Governors' Association meeting and volunteers helped with the construction of a new housing community in New Orleans' Upper Ninth Ward. The project, known as the Musicians' Village, was conceived by native jazz musicians Branford Marsalis and Harry Connick Jr. in partnership with New Orleans Area Habitat for Humanity. The community is just under way but plans for 300 houses as a way to help displaced musicians and others come home.)
The home-building charity is making the appeal because of ramped-up construction, not because of complaisance or a drop-off of volunteers for the group, said Ken Meinert, a Canadian engineer who is heading Habitat's hurricane recovery program.
"Thank God that Habitat volunteers have a little longer memory than some of the general public," Meinert said. "We're getting some return volunteers. Some who went early are now returning with friends and family."
With the work pace increasing, it's important to keep volunteers in the pipeline, he said, noting that some who volunteer now may not get to work on the Gulf Coast until sometime in the fall.
"People who have been there are our best advocates," he said. "When you see the devastation along the Mississippi Coast and in the greater New Orleans area, it's just overwhelming. That stays with you a long time.
"There's so much today that looks not very much different than it did 10 months ago," he said.
Habitat isn't the only charity still in search of more volunteers to help out with hurricane recovery efforts.
Red Cross officials have been working to increase their ranks of volunteers all along the Gulf Coast.
"With all of the spontaneous volunteers immediately following Katrina, chapters have been working very hard to integrate those volunteers into the ongoing chapter disaster programs, that's been a good source of recruitment," said Bob Howard, a spokesman for the Red Cross' hurricane recovery program.
In the initial surge of interest in helping with the recovery, Habitat had to turn some volunteers away because there was no place for them to stay, Meinert said. Most of the available housing was filled with disaster victims and emergency workers.
Now, there's a school at St. Bernard Parish, La., known as Camp Hope, that can accommodate about 1,000 Habitat volunteers. Bunkhouses in the Gulfport area can house another 300. Some Habitat volunteers also stay in air-conditioned tents.
Habitat has set a goal of building 1,000 homes for hurricane victims by next July.
"We're on a good path to that," Meinert said, noting that 117 homes have been completed and another 233 are under construction at 17 sites from Beaumont, Texas, to Mobile.
Following Katrina, Habitat compiled a database of about 31,000 people, groups and families willing to help in the recovery. Of those, an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 Habitat volunteers have come, some to work for Habitat for Humanity International and others for the group's 17 affiliates in the area, Meinert said.
It's hard to know exactly how many actual Habitat volunteers were there because some of the volunteers may have been members of church groups, rather than Habitat affiliates, he said.
With the work intensifying, there are occasional spot shortages of workers. "We certainly have slowed projects because we may have had 10 volunteers when we needed 30,"
Meinert said.
© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

All I'm going to say is that if they hadn't held onto their lists of volunteers for over 6 months and not allowed them to go down - that lack of housing thing is NOT true - they probably wouldn't be in the position they are in now. They didn't seize the moment and people have moved on.