What we will be doing
Background
Pictures of the Service Project Site, St. Bernard Parish, and Lower Ninth Ward
Video of St. Bernard Parish

On Monday, March 16, we will be participating in an all day service project in an effort to assist the New Orleans community in one of its rebuilding efforts. Below are details of this exciting project.

What we will be doing

UJC is partnering with St. Bernard Parish in its efforts to rebuild the remains of Archbishop Hannan High School into a state of the art youth complex with the ability to host regional sporting events, theater productions and concerts. It will also be a venue for local sports leagues and a gathering place for teenagers. It will serve the entire St. Bernard Parish community, providing a valuable resource as the community rebuilds.

We will spend an entire day working on transforming the former Archbishop Hannan High School into the Hannan Youth Complex. We'll be painting, landscaping, laying pipes, building structures, and much more. We'll accomplish a lot, but this is more than a day's work--it's a long-term project that young adult divisions throughout the federation system can connect with long after the New Orleans Conference has ended.

Background

St. Bernard Parish, a community located 15 minutes outside of the heart of New Orleans, was devastated by Hurricane Katrina. The eye of the storm passed over the most populated area in St. Bernard Parish, destroying its levees. As a result, nearly every home and building in the parish was flooded and most every area was left with approximately eight feet of standing water. In many areas, houses were smashed or washed off of their foundations by a storm surge higher than their roofs.

Most people who lived in St. Bernard Parish before Hurricane Katrina worked in New Orleans. It is a place where several generations of families lived in the same neighborhoods and traditions are strong. Yet, despite its near total devastation, St. Bernard Parish has received little to no media attention as its citizens work their fingers to the bone to rebuild the community they hold so dear.

Before Hurricane Katrina, Archbishop Hannan High School was the only Catholic high school in St. Bernard Parish.  It had a large campus with several school buildings, a separate performing arts center with a 200-seat theater, and extensive athletic facilities—including a baseball stadium, a softball field and a lighted football stadium. Its large library was equipped with a media center, its science wing had networked computer labs and there was a newly remodeled foreign language lab. Hurricane Katrina literally washed away all but one of these buildings. 

Archbishop Hannan High School decided to rebuild 40 miles away, across Lake Pontchartrain. What remains on its original campus is one damaged building, overrun athletic fields and a former football field that until recently housed hundreds of FEMA trailers.