Alerts should be better, Hispanic residents say
Posted on Friday, March 17, 2006
ROGERS — When Patricia Garcia heard a siren Sunday, she didn’t know it was forecasting severe weather.
After she heard a second siren and a weird noise, she woke her daughter, Myra Rentio. "We didn’t know it was coming," Rentio said. She and her daughter were on her bed when the roof collapsed, and Rentio said nails from the roof were driven into the bed as though hammered into place. "We can’t even believe it how we’re alive," said Rentio, who covered herself and her child with a blanket.
Days later, they still don’t know where to go for help. Their insurance company issued a check for $500, which is supposed to feed and house a family of six. Rentio said the family is now renting an apartment that cost $800 with a deposit. She doesn’t know if any more insurance money is coming, and Garcia worries that looters will steal what little remains of their house on Little Flock Drive.
Garcia said the Hispanic community needs to know who to call for help. "It’s a really bad experience," she said.
Several Hispanic families flocked to the Rogers Fire Station when they heard the tornado sirens and waited out the storm in the firefighters’ living quarters. "I think people are forgetting that we have a growing population that we need to inform," said Al Lopez, a Rogers resident who works as community liaison for the Springdale School District, adding that there are no tornados in Mexico. He wants to know who should be responsible for letting Latinos know about the danger of such storms.
Eddie Vega tried his best to keep Hispanics informed by broadcasting minute-byminute updates of the storm on 95.7 FM, La Zeta, a Spanish radio station based in Bentonville. He said the radio covered the storm from 9 p.m. Sunday through 2 a.m. Monday. "We had a lot of people listening and a lot of people calling," Vega said. "It’s not true that a lot of them didn’t know what to do." He added that people familiar with the radio station knew to tune in.
But why wasn’t an alert given on satellite television? That’s what Cesar Aguilar, director of Rogers Community Support Center, wants to know. "In my case, Sunday, I didn’t know that a tornado was coming because I was watching Spanish TV. The only reason I learned that we had a tornado was because a friend warned me," Aguilar said. With the technology available in 2006, Aguilar said, warnings should be given in Spanish on Spanish-speaking programs and in English on English-speaking programs, even for nationwide broadcasts.
Megan Guinn, Latino outreach coordinator for Springdale-based The Crisis Center, said the nonprofit referral agency received several inquiries about how to get help after the storm hit.
Garcia said she hasn’t contacted The Crisis Center, but she hopes it — or someone — can help her.
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