Vision | Mission | Board

On the morning of Saturday August 30th, 2008, in response to the approach of Hurricane Gustav, local officials activated the City Assisted Evacuation Plan for the first time since its inception in 2006. The purpose of the CAEP is “to help citizens who want to evacuate during an emergency, but lack the capability to self-evacuate,” by utilizing trains, buses, and planes. During the CAEP, over 200 volunteers assisted evacuation operations at the Union Passenger Terminal from which evacuees left the city. Volunteers were also on hand at City Hall inside the New Orleans 311 information center registering evacuees. An equal number were present to assist the re-entry of the 20,000 beneficiaries of the CAEP.

What Americans saw during the two days of evacuating were tens of thousands of New Orleanians leaving their city on chartered buses. What they didn’t see were volunteers, young and old, native and newly-moved, offering their skills and manpower to assist the evacuation.

They translated to non-English speakers. Helped seniors off platforms. Tagged pets with registration collars. Distributed water and snacks. Lugged heavy baggage. Many of these evacuation volunteers had no idea what was in store for them over the course of their time, but were willing to help however they were needed.

The Gustav CAEP was a success, but simultaneously revealed many areas that could be improved. Stronger initial coordination and planning, for example, would allow willing volunteers to report to pick-up locations across the city at pre-determined times rather than all converging on the embarkation stations. Early identification of job responsibilities combined with annual and pertinent trainings would allow specialized volunteers to more effectively and efficiently perform their duties. Finally, conducting outreach and establishing relationships with organizations that desire to assist the evacuation of high-need populations will allow greater empowerment of evacuation volunteers across the city.

Thus, Evacuteer.org was launched on June 2, 2009 as an organization of New Orleans citizens committed to serving as “evacuteers” upon the future initiation of the CAEP. The organization received its 501c3 charitable status in September 2009 and is committed to a public/private funding model.

vision

Evacuteer.org believes that like-minded organizations with volunteer manpower as well as unaffiliated citizen volunteers can coordinate their efforts at a level of effectiveness higher than any could do acting independently.

We believe that citizens and neighborhoods can have as much power and effectiveness keeping their neighbors safe as any private or governmental organization has. We believe that we can deliver programming that will reduce the amount of carless New Orleanians thinking of staying inside the city for the next hurricane.

Our goal is successful, efficient, sanitary, and safe evacuation of all New Orleanians upon initiation of the CAEP.

mission

• To develop a network of organizations committed to assisting evacuteer.org upon initiation of the CAEP
• To empower Evacuteer Liaisons within partner organizations in order to keep expectations and trainings up-to-date
• To establish a broad and diverse donation revenue stream to support evacuteer.org initatives, with the ultimate goal of perpetually improving operational effectiveness of volunteer use during evacuations
• To be the premier volunteer-mobilization entity in the City of New Orleans for individuals and organizations committed to assisting in the CAEP