Originally posted by Valhall
Somewhere -
We affirm the autonomy of the local church.
Then affirm it, and support it rather than denegrate it unwittingly simply because you desired to
post a negative view of the very camp that your church agreed to lease to the government and instal with its volunteers.
It is about time that your initial post is excised and exposed for its propagandist portrayal as suited you.
You wasted no time to set your scene for the obvious slant of your story by your choice of language:
This is no place to start a new
life.
The very fact that you deemed it necessary to inconspicuously take pictures of law enforcement cars speaks to your intended hunt for
controversy.
It is evident that you are a member of the Southern Baptist Congregation, yet you reduce this facility built on the donations of those just like you,
from what I am sure the SBC envisions as a camp basking in serenity, peace and beauty, which they purposefully nestled within the hills far enough
from the hustle and bustle of towns for the young of your fellow Baptists to enjoy, to a heavily guarded Gulag like camp planted in the middle of the
Siberian hills of Oklahoma. Did you ever object to the congregations’ children being sequestered in this isolated place where they themselves no
doubt cannot come and go as they please, and does the term; ‘camp’ bother you only when the word; ‘youth’ does not appear before it, or does
your concern only turn to depression when adults from out of state will be filling the dormitories? You! After all, must have been agreement with this
choice of real estate for the placement of the youth camp, and I would hazard a very good guess, that your description of the very same scenery would
read like it were paradise nestled between the arms of God.
Your tone intended from the very beginning to lead the reader down a path that you decided they must go, and it is important that I isolate some of
that from the cutie niceties of your interspersed within it, and do so in one quote:
All of sudden the landscape changed from picturesque
mountainous rural America, to something foreign to me as we approached the rear gate of the camp. Two Oklahoma State Patrol vehicles and four Oklahoma
Troopers guarded the gate…
We noticed that the various church cabins had numbered placards on them that normally weren’t there… [pic provided]
Then we got the first negative message. “You can’t bring any clothes in. FEMA has stated they will accept no more clothes. They’ve had 30 people
sorting clothes for days. They don’t want anymore.” My mind couldn’t help but go back over the news articles that have accused FEMA of refusing
water in to Jefferson Parrish, or turning fuel away…
… we learned our cabin had been designated a “male only” cabin. Approximately 40 men, ranging from age 13 on up would be housed there…
… The “host” (the hosts are Oklahoma civilians who have been employeed??? by FEMA…
… have already gone through at least one “orientation” meeting conducted by FEMA at “BASE” which is some unknown but repetitively referred
location within the camp)…
That’s when we got the next message: They will not be able to use the kitchen.
Excuse me? I asked incredulously.
FEMA will not allow any of the kitchen facilities in any of the cabins to be used by the occupants due to fire hazards. FEMA will deliver meals to the
cabins. The refugees will be given two meals per day by FEMA. They will not be able to cook
the “host” goes on to explain, some churches had already enquired about whether they could come in on weekends and fix meals for the people
staying in their cabin. FEMA won’t allow it because there could be a situation where one cabin gets steaks and another gets hot dogs – and…
it could cause a riot.
It gets worse.
He then precedes to tell us that some churches had already enquired into whether they could send a van or bus on Sundays to pick up any occupants of
their cabins who might be interested in attending church. FEMA will not allow this.
If they leave the camp they may never return. They will be issued FEMA identification cards and “a sum of money” and they will remain within the
camp for the next 5 months.
… “Welcome to Krakow…”
…This scares my mother who asks “Do you mean they have leased it?...”
…“There will be no milk, ma’am.”…It could cause a riot…”
… It could cause a riot. You don’t understand the type of people that are about to come here….”
… the host says to me and my daughter, “How did you get in here?”…
“No, HOW did you get in here? No one who doesn’t have credentials showing is supposed to be in here.” (I had noticed all the “hosts” had two
or three badges hanging around their necks.)…
“Well, starting in the morning NO ONE comes in…”
But there was more…an Oklahoma Department of Safety truck and a military vehicle…
and a cell phone tower…
A horde of “hosts” who had been hovering at a nearby cabin head toward us…
…It’s at that point my son pulls me aside and says, “Every damned one of them have the same phone…”
This cabin was apparently commandeered by a group of people in navy blue jumpsuits with insignias all over them.[pic provided]
Three firetrucks parked along the river.[pic provided]
Talk about a surreal moment…troops (unknown if Regular or National Guard) have taken up residency in the Durant First Baptist Church cabin very near
the main gate of the camp.
we passed a row of about 6 or 8 ambulances parked in the street just in front of the troop cabin, and the large tent on the top of the hill…we have
no idea what that is for.[pic provided]
Main gate completely blocked by OHP vehicles as we approach: [pic provided]
Yes, I suppose you would rather that you and anyone else would be able to drive up, drive through and go any and everywhere desired. That the
SBC would be quite willing to house 3,000 people-- a number larger than that of Davis by your own admission, on their property, and provide no
security and no medical assistance when according to you, the next nearest trace of civilization is found
The road has not a single home on it
for over 3 miles. After battling that 3 miles over mountains, you’ll find yourself about 5 miles from the nearest town, Davis, Oklahoma, population
ca. 2000
Do you suppose that Davis has its own such resources? Either you expect the doctors in that town to be fully able to address and treat
any illness and disease any of these 3,000 new inhabitants may have contracted from feces, rotting corpse, slime and oil infested sludge and waters,
and the evacuees to police themselves, or you gave it no thought as to the necessity for these services.
Yet, I see no picture of any towering gate or fence surrounding the premises, and the four officers answering only to the wiles of your smile allowed
you to pass unescorted through the gate. Such slack security this for a place you present as wanting to hold in isolation and bondage, 3,000 people
far from their home state. So slack in fact that they would allow four people whom they have never set eyes on before, nor checked out to roam about
inside.
I fail to understand the relevance of your noting the cabins were numbered, after all it is a universal identifier for finding anything from the
sleaziest motel room to the swankiest abode on the planet. I would take it for fact that the cabins being sequentially numbered would be far easier to
find than trying to locate the plethora of names each has been assigned by their church sponsor.
And God forbid that you missed the notice by a host of agencies including your SBC that clothing and food is not what is wanted at this. If one is to
conclude that such donations are a bad thing, then one must also conclude that your Southern Baptist Church is in cahoots with FEMA to starve and keep
naked, these displaced and transplanted evacuees. From the “hosts” as you put it who showed up in droves to meet the SBC call for volunteers,
right through to whomever controls the purse-strings.
We see no picture of the kitchen(s) in your photos, why not? What we see is a picture of a dormitory built initially to house children, with bunk-beds
neatly laid with crisp white sheets. Whom would you expect to be doing the cooking for this dormitory if it were the residents, and how exactly would
you allocate the rush to the kitchens by a few to prepare their favourite meals for the rest of the crowd? Evidently you are not aware that since this
“detention camp” has been turned over for control to a party other than the property owners, said property owners’ insurance coverage is
extremely limited. And evidently you do not understand that Government when it comes to property insurance prefers the self-insured route, which means
that they do not have the deep pockets of AIG or FM to look to for settling fire claims or other coverages of destruction.
Why exactly the leasing of the property to FEMA would “scare” your mother certainly is a conundrum. I trust that those who were sheltered by FEMA
as lousy a job as they are doing, are quite pleased that FEMA managed to come up with housing in their time of need. The issue at present for those
displaced by Katrina is first and foremost to find them adequate shelter. It should come as no surprise to anyone that such shelter would be temporary
and cannot be expected to be a lovely little community sitting empty waiting for a disaster to strike hundreds of thousands so as to fill these homes
and cul-de-sacs with new settlers and their gleeful kids and pets. And as charitable as your SB peers might be, the operative word here is
“leased” meaning that for those who control the finances of the congregation engaged in a business transaction, likely for monetary gain.
These “hosts” as you connote so negatively were who exactly? You gave no mention of their affiliation, how they got there and on whose behalf they
act. You further provided no name by which said hosts can be identified. I see no commandeering of anything, where is the evidence of guns? What I
see are a few people relaxing, just as I see security vehicles and ambulances. And I certainly see no pictures from you of there being on these
premises a police station or hospital where these vehicles would normally be parked. I saw nothing as to the credentials of this yes ma’am host that
would even suggest he would be in the know as to the plans of this commandeered youth camp, all I saw was an insalubrious representation of an
alarmist.
I would rather doubt that an unnamed and nonqualified (by you) volunteer would venture to bark at anyone just dropping off a donation:
” “Well,
starting in the morning NO ONE comes in…” without qualifying why that would be so, and I note that none of you apparently bothered to pursue
the reason behind this edict.
Setting the tone positively Valhall, would have changed the entire impression of your visit had you after describing the lovely area noted that upon
arrival at the gate and then through the gate you were pleased to see that security had been set in place not only to ensure that the churches’
property was safeguarded but that in such a remote place adequate protection and medical aid had been provided for the health, safety and welfare of
the temporary community of 3,000. That you were delighted to learn that ample clothing was said to be on hand, that accommodations were clean, tidy,
that beds were being readied and that the evacuees would be provided with two decent meals each day. And thanks to the overwhelming response from
hundreds of volunteers who cared enough to drive long distances, the response provides a ratio of 1 volunteer for every 8 residents.
You could even have chosen to end same by stating that you were perplexed as to the nazi-like (that which you portray) attitude of the volunteer. But
you did not.
