USU students to lend helping hands in New Orleans over Spring Break

By Jen Pulham

January 30, 2006 | In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the people of New Orleans have had help from many organizations, including the American Red Cross, the USA Freedom Corps and the LDS church. Utah State University will add its name to the list at this year's Spring Break.

USU's Alternative Breaks service group will take 30 students to New Orleans during Spring Break to assist in clean-up and food packaging.

Brandy Barton is a junior at USU and is has been the director of Alternative Breaks since fall. Alternative Breaks does service projects year-round on campus and throughout the community. The group has spent Spring Breaks in years past traveling to different areas to do service. Members have helped in Chicago, Hawaii and St. George. When it came time to decide where to go this year, the group voted on New Orleans, Barton said.

Barton's first job was to find some organizations that needed help. "I got on the Internet and looked at different sites to see if they needed help with anything," she said.

She also sent out e-mails asking organizations if they needed help, and if they didn't, could they pass the information along to someone who did. Finally she was contacted by Operation Blessing. According to its Web site, www.ob.org, Operation Blessing is a non-profit organization that provides goods and services to those in need.

Among relieving hunger, teaching life skills and helping children, Operation Blessing is also their when disaster strikes. They were able to help many people after the tsunami in Southeast Asia, and now they are helping to fix the damage left in Katrina's wake.

Operation Blessing will be providing the volunteers with food, housing and security.

"We'll be sleeping on cots, bringing our own sleeping bags," Barton said. Operation Blessing will also be providing 24-hour security. Barton also contacted Second Harvest Food Bank to offer them volunteer assistance.

Ali James, volunteer coordinator for Harvest, willingly accepted. "We love having out-of-town volunteers," James said.

Harvest has been around since 1982 and distributes 100,000 pounds of food per month, James said. From June 2004 to June 2005, it distributed 14.5 million pounds of food. Since Katrina struck, it has distributed 40 million pounds.

Alternative Breaks will be working in the re-pack room.

"This area in our warehouse is staffed solely by volunteers," James said. Participants will sort and pack food received from donations. That food is then distributed to different parishes, orphanages, senior care centers, and other places in need.

James loves working with volunteers.

"It's been one of the most lovely things to see how much they care," she said. "It brings tears to my eyes."

In addition to doing service, Alternative Breaks also will play the part of tourists. Barton plans to visit the French Quarter and some cemeteries, and listen to jazz music.

The application deadline is Friday and the trip will cost around $300. Barton is working on finding the cheapest airfare, so the dates are not yet set, but will most likely be March 12-18. Anyone interested can contact Barton at brandylb@cc.usu.edu.

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