Huntington Students Help Build Hope and Housing in New Orleans
A group of Huntington High School students traveled to New Orleans this summer to rebuild hope and housing in the St. Bernard Parish section of the city, which is still trying to recover from deadly and devastating Hurricane Katrina.
The teenagers are members of Huntington’s Habitat for Humanity club and they worked alongside their New Orleans chapter colleagues to assist in the reconstruction efforts in an area that saw all but one of its 30,000 homes damaged or destroyed.
The trip was supervised by club advisor Robert Gilmor, who also serves as a high school dean of students. Mr. Gilmor, business teacher Suzi Biagi, guidance counselor Gloria Jaramillo and eleven students helped prepare a community center for reconstruction, served dinner at a food kitchen, and built the floor, two exterior walls and three interior walls of a home in Chalmette, Louisiana.
The students included Habitat for Humanity Club President Madeleine Jensen, Zain Aiman, Daniella Charzuk (Mr. Gilmor’s niece from William Floyd High School), William Cohn, Danielle Gershowitz, Colin Limbach, Catalina Lopez, Ricki Norton, Brian Teubner, Edgar Sanchez, and Brian Venturino.
The group’s days were long, hot, dirty, and filled with the energy that comes from knowing you are truly making a difference in people’s lives. In the community center, the group worked alongside a youth group from the Midwest, cleaning out the mud, water, and debris left by Katrina almost two years ago.
“I am so proud to be a part of two youth groups from different parts of the United States that came together to make a difference for the future youth of the bayou community,” Mr. Gilmor said when the group returned.
Adding to the group’s experience was a meaningful visit from the woman whose home they were constructing. “It was such a unique experience to meet the homeowner and hear her stories,” Ms. Jensen said. “It gave us a deeper connection to the work we were doing and to the New Orleans area as a whole.” Before leaving the home site, the crew wrote their heartfelt wishes for health and prosperity on the house’s wooden uprights and doorframes. 
During a tour of the area, Mr. Gilmor and the Habitat club group were struck by the devastation that remains across large sections of New Orleans’ communities. Homes still bear the spray-painted messages of survivors and rescuers, water stains on buildings are mute reminders of how high the water rose and how long it lingered, and tree trunks shredded of their outer branches still push out new foliage on their few remaining limbs.
“The trip was more successful than I could ever have hoped,” Ms. Jensen said. “I look forward to organizing a return trip next year to continue aiding the devastated New Orleans area, and to forge a stronger bond with the people there.”
“Our work in New Orleans and our earlier work in Yonkers, as well as other Suffolk towns only brings us that much closer to building our Habitat home in the Huntington community,” Mr. Gilmor said.
The local project is a priority for the Huntington group. “The town has selected the site, and Suffolk Habitat is ready to build,” Mr. Gilmor said. “We have been seeking paperwork from the town for more than a year and understand it will be ready for Town Board approval within two months, so our vision for a Huntington house may become a reality. Our efforts in the upcoming year will be to build this Huntington home and with town government support and some additional funds, Huntington High School will be able to add to its many accolades, co-sponsorship or even full sponsorship of a Huntington-built home.”
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