dizfactor posted: As someone who was involved in the relief effort myself, I have to say that a lot of that perception may have something to do with the nature of the aid different types of organizations can provide. I was with the Red Cross, and while we provided some care on the level of the individual family (which was what I did), most of our efforts were focused on a larger scale than that, because we had an infrastructure which could deal with tasks like that (sort of). We coordinated our efforts with local community organizations, which were better suited to more long-term, one-on-one aid relationships with people in their community because they know them, they have established relationships, etc. Conversely, local community organizations acting individually can't handle the larger scale logistical issues that much larger organizations can. Each does something the other can't, or at least can't do well. The fact that people feel like they got more aid from their local church then they did from secular organizations like the Red Cross is largely a result of the fact that they're more likely to see aid from local community organizations up close, and basically the only local community organizations of consequence in Louisiana and Mississippi are religious.
