Rabbi sent to relieve hurricane’s victims is sent home by another

by Johanna Ginsberg
NJJN Staff Writer

A local rabbi sent by Yeshiva University to coordinate Hurricane Katrina aid was evacuated from Houston last week as Hurricane Rita bore down on the Texas coast.

Rabbi Aryeh Lightstone, assistant rabbi of Ahawas Achim B’nai Jacob & David in West Orange, was evacuated from Houston Sept. 20. Lightstone had been sent by Yeshiva University at the request of the Jewish Federation of Greater Houston to help coordinate aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina who had temporarily resettled in Houston.

Lightstone and two colleagues flew to Houston Sept. 4 on two days’ notice at the request of YU president Richard Joel. The effort was spearheaded by YU’s Center for a Jewish Future, for which Lightstone has already managed a number of projects, including a two-week community education effort in Denver.

Their primary responsibility was to coordinate the Jewish task force for Operation Compassion, an interfaith initiative responsible for food and humanitarian services at the George R. Brown Convention Center and other shelters across the city. Organized by the Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston with the cooperation of city and state agencies, it involved all the religious communities of the city and was administered by its Second Baptist Church.

Back in West Orange, Lightstone described a situation he will not soon forget. He compared the evacuees from New Orleans to those from foreign countries. “A refugee is a refugee,” he told NJ Jewish News. “It’s hard to picture, but one day these people were driving $30,000 cars, living in nice houses; their children went to private schools. Now they’re lining up for food stamps because it’s the only way to put food on the table. When you see that, then you really know what’s going on here.”

When he arrived in Texas, he told NJJN, he was ready to be received by a city in chaos and a federation full of exhausted, overwhelmed employees and volunteers. Instead, he found something quite different.

“People were so welcoming, from those providing us with home hospitality to those jumping at the opportunity to volunteer.” One of the volunteers was herself an evacuee from New Orleans. “Instead of taking care of herself, she chose to come to work at the federation to take care of others,” said Lightstone. And the police had everything under control. “There was no question who was in charge. I can’t say enough about the Houston police.”

The YU team was initially “daunted” by the idea that they would be coordinating “everything from food to security to housing for 250,000 people” in a city none had visited before, said Lightstone. But by the time they arrived, security was no longer an issue. And within two days, the team completed its assigned task, which had been expected to take two weeks. In fact, by Sunday night, after just three phone calls to area synagogues, they had signed up 750 volunteers and had held the necessary training sessions.

It was Lightstone’s task to coordinate general relief for the Jewish community.

That involved everything from finding alternative housing for people at the Astrodome affiliated with the Jewish community to providing not only forks and knives, but food and the money to buy it with, he said. And Lightstone found he had to make decisions about how to distribute the enormous amount of money and unsolicited goods pouring in, from the 10 million pairs of socks someone had collected, to the 2,500 T-shirts printed with the slogan, “We Love You, From the People on Mars,” sent by a woman in California.

Complicating the efforts were the enormous financial losses suffered by the New Orleans Jewish community, whose members were mostly middle and upper middle class. “We’re used to being givers, not takers,” one client said to Lightstone.

The rabbi was lucky enough to secure donated warehouse space for six months and was going to create a kind of thrift shop there with all the items — until he spoke with the evacuees about the plan and realized no one would use the shop. Lightstone was struck by an axiom from the Talmud: “One measure earned by oneself is better than nine measures given by a friend.” He came to the conclusion that “the only way to deal with people and preserve their dignity is to funnel cash and gift cards to them,” he said.

Instead of the thrift shop, he set up a program to enable people to purchase furniture at cost from a local furniture shop with donated cash. “The families consider it an interest-free loan. In reality, they never have to pay the money back — but they can do what they want.”

He accompanied the first family to use the program to the store and watched as the wife, a lawyer, contemplated her purchases. “She didn’t mess around. She knew exactly what would match the rest of the apartment and set to work.” After the purchase was concluded, he was part of a scene of tears and hugs and excitement. It only lasted, however, until the woman checked her watch and realized she was late for her appointment — to wait in line for food stamps. “That was a very sad moment in the week,” said Lightstone.

After returning to West Orange for Shabbat to attend a bar mitzva service, Lightstone found himself seeing everything from a different perspective. As the host family fretted about ensuring that every little thing would go smoothly at the Friday night dinner following services, he thought back to the scene in Houston, where Friday night dinner was “come one, come all —or people wouldn’t have Friday night dinner.”

Lightstone said he expects to go back to Houston for 24-hour stints to help several families with their furniture purchases but does not expect to have any further extended stays there. As Hurricane Rita swirled toward Houston, Lightstone noted the irony. “After we loaded the new furniture into the first family’s apartment, we helped them evacuate the area. Hopefully, this new furniture will not be lost as well.”

Johanna Ginsberg can be reached at jginsberg@njjewishnews.com.

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