Nearly two years after Hurricane Katrina tore through St. Bernard Parish in Louisiana and rising flood waters dislodged a one-million-gallon crude-oil storage tank at the New Orleans Murphy Oil refinery, contaminating 1,700 homes in an adjacent one-square-mile neighborhood, the residents of this devastated area are still on hold. Some are still living in FEMA trailers or with relatives, uncertain about when, or whether, to return to their oil-stained homes. However, help is on the way.

A multidisciplinary team of University of Michigan students from the School of Natural Resources and Environment has just completed a two-year environmental-justice study of St. Bernard Parish and the Murphy Oil spill, which occurred in September 2005.

The four graduate students involved in the masterí¢â‚¬â„¢s degree project also have compiled a 100-page citizens' handbook, entitled "RESPOND: A Residential Oil Spill in St. Bernard Parish, LA," which they are distributing free-of-charge to parish residents.

The handbook is intended to inform displaced families about the extent of the contamination problem in their neighborhood and to help them take a sustainable approach to rebuilding their community.

The Michigan team, which includes Heather Gott, Katherine Foo, Suzanne Perry and Meredith Haamen, made several fact-finding trips to New Orleans and worked closely with the nonprofit community-service organization Louisiana Bucket Brigade to conduct citizensí¢â‚¬â„¢ soil-sampling projects and to interpret the laboratory results from collected samples.

The students also created a 10-page survey, which they used to interview 200 respondents, in order to learn where information gaps existed and how best to communicate reliable facts to residents. "In our survey, we found that people were frustrated with the lack of information or the conflicting information they were receiving from state and federal government agencies," explains Gott, a third-year graduate student who is pursuing a dual degree in environmental justice and environmental law. "Residents wanted more definitive guidelines on what to do. We hoped to give them peace of mind by providing information that would help them make informed decisions."

Gott and her project team members raised $20,000 to help pay for the cost of the project and the printing of 200 copies of the full-color, hard-cover RESPOND handbook, which is available on line at http://sitemaker.umich.edu/respond.

The handbook contains sections on risk evaluation, the health effects of different types of contamination in homes and gardens, suggestions for phyto-remediation (plants that absorb contaminants), and guidelines for community organizing and neighborhood-scale projects.

"We tried to celebrate the beauty and rich culture of the parish by including photos taken by residents and by highlighting local environmental heroes," Gott says. "Rather than instilling fear, we sought to answer residents' questions in a positive way and to give the community the tools to respond constructively."

University of Michigan project advisors, including environmental-justice advocate and professor Bunyan Bryant, public-health specialist Gregory Button and statistician Elaine Hockman, provided valuable guidance to the students throughout their endeavor.

"This project was unique because it was community-based and we spent a lot of time listening to peoples' needs and responding in a way that we hoped would assist them," Gott says. "There are a lot of residual contamination questions in the parish and throughout greater New Orleans. We hope our work will serve as a model to communities that face similar challenges."

By Claudia Capos

For more information, contact Mary Vingerelli, at the School of Natural Resources and Environment, at 734.763.6605 or vingerel@umich.edu.