[Katrina-IT-Volunteers] Katrina disaster response web sites guide available

[Dale Thompson/Austin Free-Net]

The html version of our guide to Katrina disaster response websites and
online services for evacuees is now available along with the pdf version
at:

http://www.austinfree.net/hurricaneresources.htm

thanks to Emily Bromberg, who put all of this information in a coherent
format and used her web savvy to make it all available to you.

This is a guide for evacuees about how to use the many online services and
very useful web sites for evacuees, based on information gathered by
computer volunteers at the convention center shelter and updated as best
as we know at this writing:

- Local resources(looking up bus schedules and routes, health services,
housing, etc.)
- how to setup an e-mail account to stay in touch with loved ones
- how to register yourself in the peoplefinder databases as safe
- how to search for news of loved ones in the peoplefinder databases
- where to get information on disaster unemployment and many, many more
online services

We still need to add information on legal aid available, I believe, and we
get updated information pretty regularly so the documents will change
fairly regularly for awhile.

The guide is meant to be helpful to evacuees themselves and the computer
volunteers helping them.  We found at the convention center that most of
the evacuees had no computer skills, but were eager to learn, have e-mail,
and check things like their FEMA status online.  Our primary goal was to
get them registered with the Red Cross Family Links registry, teach them
to search online for news of loved ones, and get an e-mail account so they
could stay in contact wherever they wound up.  The rest just came with the
territory.

Please let us know if you have any important resources to add.


Dale Thompson, Financial Manager
Austin Free-Net (www.austinfree.net)
Fix-Net (www.austinfix.net)
512.326.9084 x10
Fax:  512.974.3477