In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, only one thing is completely clear. We as a nation were completely unprepared for a disaster of this magnitude.

We are no strangers to disaster. Mount St. Helens, California earthquakes, midwest tornadoes, and even category 5 hurricanes have hit this country regularly enough to keep us attuned with the possibilities that disaster presents. But strong buildings, proper planning and warning systems, and a host of other factors have prevented us from truly experiencing the realities of a worst case scenario.

Until now, that is.

With New Orleans and Biloxi, Mississippi all but destroyed and much of that portion of the Gulf Coast in the rebuilding process, we are quick to call for the heads of our leaders to "do something", ignoring the fact that most of what we are demanding they do falls beyond the scope of their constitutional authority. And we're ready to tax everything that's not nailed down to pay for the reconstruction.

But there has never been a better time to explain WHY private donations are better than bureaucratic bungling to repair the damage. Thousands of victims lie on cots with an uncertain future while thousands of Americans wait with beds and homes to take them in. What ties them up is bureaucracy, plain and simple. We were told that, by filing forms with the Red Cross we could get on the waiting list for housing. A waiting list that will likely take weeks to filter through; long weeks for a family forced to share a public urinal "trough" at a building meant to host athletic events, not house families. Long weeks for those same families who must wait in long lines to get their meals while another family has steaks in the freezer waiting for another family to sit out under the Texas sky enjoying dinner, fellowship, and the process of healing.

Because we have become overly reliant on bureaucracy, how many will become victims of theft and/or violence as the pressure of having 50,000 roommates becomes too much to bear and magnifies the tension felt by these families? I have lived in homeless shelters of 50, and can tell you that even those can be host to some heated arguments after days of cohabitation, let alone weeks, months, or years.

What we NEED to do is plain and simple: we NEED to get these people to homes, any way we can. We NEED to remove these people from the shelters where their mere presence is a daily reminder of their trauma, and get them to homes where they can laugh, share a movie or a joke, eat popsicles and ride bicycles down the street. We NEED to give these people the one ingredient that has so far been missing: the ingredient of HOPE. And stop relying on a bureaucracy to do it.