Nearly 2 years later, some Katrina evacuees still jobless

So it's been nearly two years since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans — and, according to the AP, about 5,500 heads of evacuee households in Houston are still unemployed. It's not that there aren't jobs available (city officials say there are 2 million job openings, 59,000 of which don't require a college education) or that the government isn't helping (the city has spent $1.9 million since the fall offering free résumé help, business clothing, job fairs and computer classes) — the problem, apparently, is that there are just too many obstacles for evacuees. "Transportation is a huge problem. Child care is a huge problem. Thinking that they were not sure they were staying in Houston was a huge problem," Cindy Gabriel, a spokeswoman for the city's Community Settlement Task Force, told the AP.

Some evacuees say the fact that they're evacuees has led them to not be able to find employment: Odessa Jarreau, a 61-year-old former parking supervisor at the Superdome, is an example. She said her daily calls to employment agencies, her visits to job fairs and looking for "help wanted" signs hasn't gotten her anywhere because of who she is. "Once we put in the applications and they see the Louisiana connection, they don't even consider it. We don't even get calls back," she said. "It drains you, you know? You feel like you're not worth anything." Jarreau was looking into a job with AARP, but it would have involved a several-hour bus trip. She failed a test to get a job cleaning airplanes, and she can't be a parking supervisor here because the job would require her to be outside, which she said she can't do because of high blood pressure.

An interesting aspect of the jobless evacuee situation has been politicians' responses to it. On one hand, we have U.S. Rep. John Culberson, who told evacuees to find jobs or leave town last summer — and hasn't changed his position one bit. "We're a charitable nation and Houston in particular has a big heart, and we have already gone way above and beyond the call of duty to help our neighbors," Culberson told the AP. "It's time for everyone who can work to get to work." And on the other hand, there's Houston Mayor Bill White, who last year took a firm, if not quite unyielding, position on evacuee employment: For those who are capable of working, then the job search needs to be time-consuming and aggressive and thorough," he said in August. But this week, White defended unemployed evacuees when speaking to the AP: "I don't think most people want to live in trailer cities or shelters. They want to get on with their lives," he said.

The AP didn't revisit one of the angles from last summer: that many obstacles to evacuees finding work are mental. "I cannot help to wonder if (the unemployment) has anything to do with the uniqueness of the community," Ayodele Ogunye, a job counselor with WorkSource, said last year. "It seems like some have never had to make choices or decide for themselves."