New Orleans JCC Cares! community service project at Biennial By Miriam Rinn
W
earing paint-spattered work clothes and a big smile, Marshall greeted a group of JCC volunteers as they got off the bus in the Ninth Ward in New Orleans. Standing on the porch of a half-finished new house, he told them that he had grown up on a farm in Mississippi, graduated from Dartmouth with a degree in unemployment, and decided to come to New Orleans to spend some time helping out. Marshall assigned the group to various chores—priming, painting, scraping, sanding, hanging doors, and cutting baseboards. The volunteers came from different communities, spanned a wide range of ages and skill levels, but everyone found something useful to do. Soon, the sound of a jigsaw filled the hot New Orleans air. For the first time, the 2012 JCCs of North America Biennial included an afternoon of hands-on service. Working with the St. Bernard Opportunity Housing Project and Beacon of Hope, four busloads of volunteers tackled different building projects to help people who had been affected by Hurricane Katrina. Marshall’s volunteers worked with the St. Bernard Project, which is building unpretentious new homes for New Orleans residents who were previously renters. With the help of grants, the Project buys empty lots from the city, clears them, and builds new homes, which are then sold to people of modest means who have lived locally for at least four years. Even six years after the storm, signs of the devastation are all over certain neighborhoods in New Orleans. In the Ninth Ward, which was among the most damaged areas, rebuilt, well maintained homes with neatly trimmed lawns stand next
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