More than four years after Katrina, people are still homeless, displaced, living in overcrowded conditions, or squatting in unstable structures.

Currently, 71,000 homes in New Orleans need to be rehabilitated. Since Katrina, homelessness has doubled to 12,000 people and just 34% of Orleans Parish Public Schools have re-opened. Only eleven percent of families have returned to live in the Lower Ninth Ward. *

Residents are discouraged by the appalling slowness of the recovery effort. Media coverage for Gulf Coast relief issues has all but disappeared. The remaining age has shifted from telling the personal stories of those impacted by Katrina to detailing exposés about corruption and bureaucratic red tape.

These are issues that depersonalize the plight of the hundreds of thousands whose lives have been disrupted because they have lost their family and friends, their homes, their neighbors, their jobs, their sense of community - the essential elements that make life worth living.

While some Katrina, Rita and Gustav survivors celebrate the triumph of rebuilding their beloved homes, there are many who feel forgotten and deserted. Those people who are suffering, those are our people and they still need our help.

Universally, Katrina survivors rely upon volunteers to bring a sense of hope, commerce, and invigorating energy to the Gulf Coast. And now, because the media focus has changed, volunteer numbers are dwindling.

Four years in, the chaos of post-Katrina disaster relief has settled and the real story of the recovery effort is just beginning to be told. It’s the neighborhood association leaders who are fighting valiantly to restore their communities; the volunteers who went for a week, fell in love with The Big Easy, and never left; or those who stayed until they ran out of money, returned home, raised more money, and went back again.

We join those who’ve chosen to be of service long after the storms have past to create a forum where we tell our stories of triumph with hope that it will inspire others; to engage and educate a new population of volunteers who will join the rebuild effort; and to help spread the word: New Orleans needs us now.

 *Statistical data was gathered from the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center.