The Hope for Stanley Foundation was formed by a committed group of 10 students from the DeVos Sport Business Management Graduate Program at the University of Central Florida after their initial week of work in the Ninth Ward of New Orleans in December 2006. Those students and more than 15 other DeVos students made four subsequent trips to work in the Ninth Ward. While they worked on other homes as well, most of their efforts were on gutting the home of Stanley and Betty Stewart. The NCAS also had a group work in the Ninth. But on that first trip, in addition to the students and DeVos Chair Richard Lapchick, his wife Ann Pasnak and daughter, Emily Pasnak-Lapchick, two people from Massachusetts joined them: Allyce Najimy and State Representative Smitty Pignatelli. While the DeVos and NCAS families did all the gutting , clearing and final painting, what follows is the amazing story of how Smitty got the inside done to allow the Stewarts to move into their home.
When the Saints Go Marching In
Written by Massachusetts State Representative Smitty Pignatelli
This is the story of a family from New Orleans who inspired the new Hope For Stanley Foundation. We met Stanley Stewart and his family at Christmas time, December 2006 in New Orleans, LA. They had just moved into their FEMA trailer after 16 long, hard months of pain and suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina. Stanley and his family of 12 relatives are only alive today because they were able to escape the 14 feet of dirty water, to the second floor in their New Orleans Ninth Ward home. After spending two days without water, food, plumbing or air-conditioning, they were finally rescued by a neighbor’s small boat from the 2nd floor balcony. The boat brought the family to a bridge, where they had to walk four miles to the Convention Center, Stanley sent his family walking to safety without him, you see he was stricken with Polio at birth which made it impossible for him to keep up. After several days at the Convention Center, still not knowing where his own family was, Stanley stayed behind to help every last person board their bus to safety, before finally boarding the bus himself.
We have had a goal to move Stanley back into his four bedroom, two bath home in time for his wife Betty to cook Thanksgiving Dinner in her own kitchen and set her own table with room enough to host her whole family. We went to New Orleans as volunteers, helping to rebuild Stanley’s home and came back as agents for change believing in the power of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Thanks to the generosity of some Massachusetts Berkshire County volunteers, we were able to put a new roof on Stanley’s home in April and most recently the crew of 25 licensed contractors and carpenters went down to Stanley’s home and completed the rebuilding of 1133 Tricou Street, the Stewart’s home in just six days. It was like our own version of “Extreme Home Makeover.” Instead of raising money for my political campaign, I asked people to help me raise money for my Campaign to help the Stewart Family move home. All of the materials were donated; floors, windows, cabinets, plumbing fixtures and sheet rock, the volunteers signed up without hesitation and because of the generosity of spirit of citizens in our county, Stanley and Betty now have a certificate of occupancy and will be moving into their home a month before Thanksgiving! There is much more work to be done but we know a small committed group of people truly can make a difference.
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