Disaster Management, Poverty and Gender: Research from New Orleans Post Katrina

Hurricane Katrina was a catastrophe of unprecedented magnitude in terms of its impact on health and well-being of residents of New Orleans. The Storm exposed some fundamental deficiencies in United States' disaster management policies and programs in meeting the needs of poor women. This research documents the effects of Katrina and disaster/recovery management action on the well-being of poor women in New Orleans. The conceptual model utilizes a sustainable livelihood framework and rights-based evaluation framework to organize data from multiple sources around an analysis that focuses on the well-being and entitlements of poor women throughout the disaster management life cycle. Multiple method research techniques are applied, including secondary data analysis, probability household surveys, participatory research and formal qualitative methods. The findings of this research document the inadequacy of the current American disaster management framework. It documents the inadequacy of priorities for recovery in supporting the household recovery of poor women. As of today, housing for low income residents who are predominantly women remains unavailable, key services that poor women rely on are under-served. These include women's health, mental health, day care/primary care and public transportation. Changes are needed in temporary housing assistance, case management, and transition planning for vulnerable populations affected by catastrophies. National policy frameworks should be adapted so that recovery can better serve as an opportunity for the poor to escape structural poverty.