One Volunteer's Tour of Duty at Lamar-Dixon: The Heat, the Sweat, the Dust, the Thrill of the Reunion

By Betsy Dribben

It was Noah's Ark on dry land. Everywhere I looked there were dogs and cats, horses and even goats—barking and bleating, woofing and whinnying. This vocal menagerie was dry-docked daily at the Lamar-Dixon temporary shelter in Gonzales, Louisiana, where I was a volunteer for a week.

Lamar-Dixon is a series of open-air barns with stalls, a YMCA building (where Katrina evacuees are housed in a gym), and a large arena. The complex is usually used for horse shows and other major events. After Katrina it was turned into the nation's largest animal shelter.

Barns 1, 2, and 5 mostly housed dogs and cats, Barns 3 and 4 mostly horses. Vets with the federal Veterinary Medical Assistance Teams (VMAT) worked in MASH-like conditions in Barn 1—IV poles and medicines on benches, operations being performed on tables in the open. At Barn 5 cages were lined with some dangerous dogs; Barn 1 contained the exotics—parrots and reptiles and other unusual critters. Ferrets and other highly sensitive animals were housed in the air-conditioned women's room! 

Assignment One: Barn Detail

I was first assigned to Barn 1. Everyone went by first names, and new volunteers appeared daily. Each stall had a chart: feeding, watering, urinating, defecating, cleaning, and walking were all meticulously logged. Each stall also had a fan to move around the heat, which at times seemed as thick as gumbo. Volunteers and some professionals formed small teams and worked every stall, each with four to six crated animals, and once the team's designated area was done, they worked through it again—on a 24-hour basis. The happiest job was walking the dogs.

The high stalls housed animals of every stripe: pure breeds and mutts, sleepy ones and alert ones who looked longingly at you in hopes you might be the one to rescue them. There were newborn kittens and old animals. Some stalls had signs that read: "Escape Artist—Do Not Open."

On top of each crate was the animal's paperwork in a plastic sheath. Everything known about the animal was put in detail on these forms; the paperwork was truly the pet's only hope for a punched ticket out of there. Some papers said, "Owner says please hold until he returns"—but, in some instances, the date for return had come and gone.

I watered each dog and cat in Barn 1 the first morning. By lunch time, I was drenched with water, and coated in dust and sweat. I was then assigned to a new task. Would I mind washing all the dog dishes? There were mounds of them that needed to be sanitized with bleach to prevent disease, and then washed with soap and water. The more I washed, the more the dishes piled up. I felt like the Sorcerer's apprentice.

My first night I slept at the gravel Hilton: I pitched my pup tent on a patch of grass covered with gravel, a flattened out piece of carton my only protection between the rocks and my sleeping bag. I dined on a Luna bar. I hadn't figured out the housing and hot food schedule yet, and I was so tired I could have slept standing up.  

Assignment Two: Lost Pet Desk

By day 2, I was on the front lines. I sat at a desk with Terrie from Utah, Sharon from Detroit, and Monica from California. We were the lost pet desk. We heard stories of people losing their pets or being forced to separate from them. Some tales were so agonizing we would have to step away from the desk and catch our tears. Each one of us knew to spell the other if we were reaching the edge.

We gave people forms to fill out and badges to wear and instructions on where and how to look at each crate. Many people were not even sure their animals had made it out of their homes. In those cases, we completed search-and-rescue reports in hopes the animals were still alive and could be saved. We went over each and every detail with them; those details could be the difference between life or death for the animal.

The ebb and flow of my days was marked by two events: Each morning in the early light, a silent parade of trucks, big and small, made its way to different New Orleans-area parishes to rescue animals. These were brave men and women. I've worked with some of them at The HSUS for years. Many others I'd never seen before. The conditions for the rescues were a mix of toxic mud, stagnant and chemically laced water, fragile buildings, high heat and mold, and very stressed animals.

Then at night, with the New Orleans curfew closing in, the process was reversed: The parade of trucks, big and small, would return to the Lamar-Dixon compound, all loaded with rescued animals from the Big Easy. From big tractor trailers with air-conditioning units to small pick-ups, the animals were gently removed from stacked crates. Sometimes a new arrival would cause a stir. One night the kennel on an animal control truck opened to reveal a rooster; another evening, a vet pulled two boa constrictors out of a burlap bag.

Each animal was examined carefully by veterinarians and vet techs with VMAT and the U.S. Public Health Service, then photographed and logged in with papers that indicated where the animal was found and other important details. The vets ran a tight ship. Decontamination was an essential step as was hydration. Animals would then be taken to vet areas or put in holding areas. Hundreds upon hundreds were brought in this way.

You Meet All Kinds

A massive hurricane and bad policies converged along the Gulf Coast, and the result has been thousands of displaced animals and their grieving owners. These two forces, one natural and the other man-made, were truly indiscriminate. They affected people from all walks of life.

I dealt with bikers in full leather, Iraqi war veterans still in uniform, ATF agents, housewives with bouffant hairdos, teenagers, doctors, street-wise guys, straight-arrow sheriffs, shy children, and couples who stood arguing at the desk because the husband described the cat as brown and the wife was sure it was orange.

I spoke French to assist one woman who wanted to make a contribution, and German with another volunteer who was cleaning cages. I ate donuts donated by a family thankful they found their elderly cat. I matched hearing-impaired folks with a volunteer who knew sign language, and ushered a World War II veteran out of the heat while his granddaughter looked for the family pet. Despite all their hardship, the Louisiana evacuees, almost to a person, were unfailingly polite, each waiting their turn in line to tell their story and seek help.

When owner and animal found each other, we were ecstatic at the front desk. Off went the professional decorum—we hugged them or gave them high fives! We averaged about 30-50 matches a day. At the same time, we were often frustrated that many families had never considered tagging or spaying or neutering their pets.

Like the evacuees, the volunteers were equally diverse. I spent time with a GM executive and a flight attendant from Alaskan Airlines. I talked with teachers in inner city schools who were given money from their fellow teachers to donate to the cause, and I met a physical therapist who was able to work at the facility because her friends chipped in and paid her way. There was an ER nurse and social event planners, a computer programmer and local cops. From Maine to Hawaii, from Canada to Mexico, people were there to help.  

Conditions improved for volunteers when a giant Federal Emergency Management Agency tent was assembled near the front gate. The bright white canvas structure with meringue-like peaks allowed me to sleep on a cot each night with 300 of my closest friends. Volunteers were so bone-tired at the end of the day there was barely a sound in the tent, except for the rhythmic sighing of the air compressor.

Each morning, I changed my clothes in a pup tent and brushed my teeth in the parking lot. I managed to take a shower twice—in horse stall showers. They were the best horse showers I have ever had!

There were Fellini-like moments during my time at Lamar-Dixon. A woman, probably around 70 years old, was dressed in all pink: pink sneakers, a pink crown and wand, and even gossamer wings on her back. She roamed the kennels in her royal pinkness. I asked her if she was going to grant me three wishes. Nope, she said, she was the poop fairy—picking up poop as she went along. She felt a little levity would help in these working conditions.

It all got me thinking: If government officials would spend even a day at Lamar-Dixon, observing the whir of activities as so many caring volunteers worked to save the lives of Katrina's animal victims and help emotionally shattered pet owners, they would never let this kind of thing happen again.

Betsy Dribben is the chief European representative for Humane Society International, the international arm of The HSUS.