Assessing the Needs After Katrina: Chairman Dana Gioia visits the Gulf Coast

"New Orleans had a devastating flood. We had a devastating hurricane." So said a local resident of Pass Christian, Mississippi, in explaining to Chairman Gioia the differences in the ravages of Katrina to the two Gulf Coast regions. As the Chairman and NEA staff toured the Gulf Coast in late August, he was shown mile after mile of flattened coastline, exposed foundations, and hollowed houses. The landscape still bore the scars of Katrina a year after she came ashore. Despite the heavy losses and devastation, Gioia was impressed with the determination of arts organizations to keep moving forward and "how quickly, how optimistically arts organizations have acted to come back into action. People are doing their best to continue, often without a building. Their commitment is reassuring."

Chairman Gioia visits with the Gulfport High School strings orchestra on his trip through the Mississippi Gulf Coast region. Photo by Shana Chase.

U.S. Senator Thad Cochran (Mississippi) invited the Chairman and his staff to conduct a grants workshop for Mississippi arts organizations. The workshop, attended by more than 120 people, was of vital importance to those organizations seeking federal assistance to recover from the damages inflicted by the hurricane and reestablish themselves in the community.

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the NEA gave more than $160,000 in emergency grants to Mississippi Gulf Coast arts organizations and agencies such as the Walter Anderson Museum of Art in Ocean Springs, the Ohr-O'Keefe Museum of Art in Biloxi, and the Mississippi Arts Commission. The Chairman used this trip to continue to assess the needs of the region and extend further opportunities for NEA assistance. "In order for the recovery of the Gulf Coast to be complete, the arts have to be restored to their place not only as viable engines of local economies, but also as irreplaceable sources of replenishment for the human spirit. The arts give us the communities we want to live in," said Gioia.

With its $10,000 NEA grant, the Walter Anderson Museum in historic Ocean Springs, Mississippi, was able to reinstate its traveling exhibition program throughout the state -- at a time when people most needed to be reminded of the power of beauty and creativity.

From Bay St. Louis to Biloxi,Mississippi Arts Commission Executive Director Malcolm White gave the visitors from Washington a detailed tour of now vanished historic sites and cultural centers. The high winds, surging ocean, and heavy rains took their toll on physical structures and strained psyches but did not destroy the desire of Gulf Coast citizens to restore their towns to the places that drew or kept them there in the first place. "We keep going. We keep moving forward," said White, whose own home was heavily damaged in the storm surge.

An illustration of the area's commitment to the future of the arts in the Gulf Coast was the music program at Gulfport High School. Chairman Gioia was treated to an early morning concert by the school's strings orchestra under the direction of Billy Ulmer and with participation by other members of Gulfport High's accomplished music faculty. "This is an impressive group of young musicians," said Gioia. "Not too many schools can boast of such high caliber faculty or student artists." The students, many of whose families suffered severe losses during the hurricane, are slated to perform at an international concert in Germany this fall.

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