Every morning, first thing, Rabbi Stan Zamek checks the Web site of the National Hurricane Center. If the forecast shows nothing with an eye or a category number headed for Louisiana, he knows it will be a good day.
Last Sept. 21, less than a month after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, Hurricane Rita hammered the same region, including Zamek’s Congregation Beth Shalom in Baton Rouge.
The synagogue suffered catastrophic water damage, especially in the sanctuary and social hall (the Torahs and other sacred objects were rescued). This happened while Beth Shalom served as a hub of emergency response for southern Louisiana’s Jewish community.
One year later, the congregation has yet to raise enough money even to begin repairs, though Zamek says they are getting close.
“We have an architect,” said the rabbi by phone from Baton Rouge. “But we haven’t raised the minimum figure we need to start. The barest minimum is our denied insurance claim: about $540,000.”
Zamek says the synagogue’s insurance company has refused to pay the claim, and litigation is under way. But the rabbi doesn’t want to wait for legal resolution, and he is continuing the campaign to raise money.
“We’ve handled it well,” he says of post-Rita existence. “The [congregants] dug in and were generous with their own contributions. The shul does not feel like a different place. It is what it has been, though people are a little weary.”
Zamek’s congregants aren’t the only ones. Since Rita and Katrina (which struck Aug. 29 of last year), the Louisiana and Mississippi Gulf coast has remained devastated. Recovery is slow and many who left have yet to return.
“Western Louisiana was heavily affected,” adds Zamek. “I wouldn’t say we’re back to normal. There are trailer parks in Baton Rouge, and lots of people in New Orleans living in trailers.”
He guesses that 70 percent of New Orleans’ Jewish community has returned to the city, though the overall population is nowhere near where it was. “These are largely middle class people who had the means to get themselves back,” he says of the Jews of New Orleans.
One positive side effect from the hurricanes was the resulting partnership between the New Orleans and Baton Rouge Jewish communities. Jewish federations and synagogues from both cities worked together to aid storm victims and congregations, and a branch of Jewish Family Services opened in Baton Rouge for the first time.
Zamek says the local Jewish community, like many in the region, has a new storm evacuation plan in place. No one wants to get caught in the rain next time.
Meanwhile, High Holy Day services this year are on for Beth Shalom’s battered sanctuary — now nothing but bare concrete, folding chairs and a makeshift sound system — but, adds the rabbi, congregants are glad to be home (last year, services were held in a nearby church).
But Zamek doubts he will talk about the hurricane in any one of his sermons, even if the evidence of Rita is still all around.
“People may want something else in the sermon,” he says. “We will mark the anniversary of Rita, but enough is enough.”
Information on how to give to the Congregation Beth Shalom Renewal Fund may be found on the synagogue Web site: www.bethshalomsynagogue.org.