'Fashion for Compassion' benefits Katrina victims

It all began with an ordinary woman, a woman who saw that suffering was abounding in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast area.

This suffering was due to the devastation that ripped through the gulf coast area in the fall of 2005. Hurricane Katrina, the sixth strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic, wreaked havoc in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

Since then, Weekender's clothing managers across the nation have been donating clothing to many of Katrina's victims. The uniqueness of this relief work is that the wardrobes are going toworking professional women -- mainly teachers -- who haven't any personal property left.

The effort began in the fall of 2005 when San Diego, Calif., resident Mary Jane Relth and her daughter decided to volunteer in New Orleans to help the victims of the hurricane.

Once there, Relth found teachers living in deplorable conditions and clothed in horrid garments.

Relth began by identifying about 600 teachers who were in need of professional clothing.

"It restores their dignity," said Nevada resident Judie Steege, a manager in the Weekender's company. Steege said that when Relth went to the Gulf Coast region she found that most of the clothes that were being donated to the victims were dingy and worn.

While the teachers were suffering in their inadequate shelters, clothing and foodstuffs, they were and are still trying to construct a semblance of a classroom system.

" Teachers are living in trailers, tents and lean-to's," informed Steege.

The Weekender's company now offers a "Fashion for Compassion" campaign to clothe the teachers. The clothing line is completely washable, no dry cleaning necessary, and comes in a 10-piece set. The 10-piece set includes three jackets, four tops and three bottoms.

These clothing items follow three different color schemes and can be pieced together to form 23 to 27 outfits. The outfits typically cost about $500, and most of the money is donated, though some does come out of the Weekender's employee's pockets.

Since this campaign began, countless heartwarming tales have come out of it.

One, for instance, comes from a former retired teacher who donated $200 and asked to have contact information in order to stay in touch with a victim, to give them support until they are back on their feet again.

"This program works better with smaller communities, people respond better." said Steege.

Eventually, the hope for the program is to reach out to other working professional women in order to benefit them as well.

"The response has been amazingly strong. Women are spending their own money to get to the Gulf Coast and outfit these women." said Steege.

The story is one that touches everyone, self sacrificing teachers caring about their students enough to try to restore some sort of educational setting for them, living in tents and wearing clothes that are unfit for work, according to Steege.

"This relief project is one of the heart," Steege said.

For more information contact Judie Steege at (417) 667-7156 or e-mail her at Steegej@hotmail. com.