Here in Portland there has been much talk about Katrina survivors being brought up here after Oregon offered space. First 1000 were supposed to arrive Wednesday, then apparently FEMA said not yet, now I hear 500 are coming Saturday. There's an old closed elementary school in the inner southeast section of town (14th and Stark) that will house them. I've biked by there several times in the last week and seen big Red Cross trucks parked there.

IMC people here are talking about and working on setting up a media center a few blocks away for the evacuees to use, but I don't know how useful that will be, since apparently there will be new computers donated by Intel and internet access right in the building they'll be staying in. I'm not sure of the best way that our IMC could help these people, at least in a unique, media-centered way. Perhaps just volunteering like regular people is best.

I wish we had CVS Pharmacies here. I'd get a bunch of those cheap camcorders that have been hacked and pass them out to residents of the evacuee facility.

Meanwhile, Blank, a very active member of our IMC video collective, flew down to Houston last night. I've heard so much about mistreatment of journalists and tight security that I'm pretty concerned, for his safety and also just for the prospect of actually being able to get any coverage. But hopefully he will manage to do some good down there. He's certainly got a lot of good gear with him.

2 good articles about New Orleans:
Trapped in New Orleans (thanx Allison)
Real Estate Vultures (thanx Jon)