Cleaning Up Ouor Own Houses

I have just arrived home after having spent over two weeks in south Georgia trying to help those who were affected by the tornadoes that it both Georgia and Alabama. It was as I hoped, a very memorable experience, with many tears and many smiles.

Both times I have been called by the Red Cross to deploy to help others, I find myself constantly amazed at how other American citizens live. Particularly before the disaster hit. I have seen Americans who literally live in hovels. 4 ply wood walls, a rug on a dirt floor, and a ply wood ceiling\roof. These are HOMES to so many.

How can we possibly allow American CITIZENS to live in these conditions!! Why are we so terribly concerned about how people in other countries live when we have people here at HOME who need our help?

We as, Americans, need to clean up our on home, before we attempt to clean up someone else's.

We need:

1. To locate and find those persons living in totally substandard conditions and either help them find affordable low loans for new or used homes, or perhaps tie in a loan with a grant for those who own their own lots. I.e. Mobile housing would be a good choice. I do not mean the FEMA homes, which are very small, and poorly put together. Putting several of these homes in one location with attractive landscaping would help to insure the care of the homes. Individuals could be hired from within the smaller community as security guards, ground maintenance, day care workers, and transportation. Training for these jobs would be cost efficient as these people would work for and be paid by the small community members themselves on a siding scale from their own incomes.

2. Use facilities already available for training members of a community for future employment. We have hundreds of empty schools at night and abandoned super stores that could be used to as to set up classrooms. These building could be donated by their owners as a tax deduction, and used to teach drop-outs, or the under-educated how to properly count money and run a cash register, care for children and elderly, reading , and even speaking English. They could even learn skills that are disappearing as our elderly die, such as tatting, wood working, canning, whittling, farming on a small scale, etc. These skills could be taught by the elderly themselves, with payment helping to supplement their fixed incomes, without effecting the amounts they presently earn. This additional money would come from small fees paid by the students or if necessary by the federal government as a small interest loan. In addition supplies would be paid for in the same manner, or even by donations from those who wish to have a greater tax deduction.

3. To develop a national insurance program for all citizens - particularly those with lower incomes. Included in this insurance would be training in nurturing, proper methods of exercise, and simple information regarding the care of colds, flu, bloody noses, CPR, the Heimlich maneuver, strokes and heart attacks, etc. In other words, how to determine an emergency from a non-emergency.

4. Lower the cost of fresh foods, such as carrots, beans, tomatoes, apple, bananas, etc. so everyone could afford to eat the required amounts of fruits and vegetable needed a day. This would be included in the supplements given to farmers for their fields.

These are merely a few of the ways we as AMERICANS could help out our own citizens. It would certainly be a better use of our tax dollars than literally mis-using it in a foreign country as has be the case thus far.