This is how business should respond to Katrina

FYI - this is a Canadian Business

Stronach's luxurious haven for victims of Katrina

by Roy MacGregor - The Globe and Mail

Frank Stronach has had wild visions before -- but never one quite like this.

This improbable dream involves airlifting evacuees from the devastation of New Orleans to the pampered world of Palm Beach, Fla. -- a vision that involves rich American whites from gated communities opening up to desperately poor American blacks and even includes the construction of a new mobile-home community in Louisiana for more than 300 victims of hurricane Katrina.

And so far, he's pulling it off.

But then, Frank Stronach once dreamed he could make a better life in Canada than his native Austria could give, and he made it happen to a point where the young man who arrived with $40 in his pocket now regularly pockets more than $50-million in salary as the chairman of Ontario-based Magna International, the $20-billion automobile parts giant he built from scratch.

He once had a vision that he would live to be 150, and today, as he turns 73, is almost half way there -- about the same point he expects to reach some time this morning on his latest wild scheme.

At that point, the final plane will touch down at Palm Beach International Airport, bringing in the last group of evacuees selected by FEMA and the American Red Cross.

This will bring the total to approximately 300, although the number may yet be increased to 400, and all will be given medical attention and new clothes courtesy of Palm Beach residents, and then taken to Magna's new training facilities at nearby Palm Meadows. There they will be housed in facilities intended for grooms and thoroughbred trainers, fed at a brand-new state-of-the-art cafeteria and, some time within the next two months, returned to Louisiana to live in a 240-hectare trailer park yet to be built.

...more

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050906/STORMSTRONACH06/Front/Idx

IF the masses rise up, and it sure sounds like we're finally on our way, we may reclaim this country and resuscitate the American Dream. Reading stories of those who "have" helping others in a direct way is what we need to see. I'd love to see a reinvigoration of the working class in this nation....and we need hope to do that.....maybe it's on the horizon.....:applause:

but he clearly cares about people.