Tara Haelle

I've been to New Orleans several times before, but only briefly as a tourist. As a journalist, I would report on health care, as I've done the past several months in other regions. At the Lower 9th Ward Health Clinic, executive director Alice Craft-Kerney explained only about 10 percent of their clients have insurance. She said most patients work but simply cannot afford insurance premiums, even if their employers offer a plan. Craft-Kerney and Patricia Berryhill, the clinical director, gave me a clear picture of the challenges 9th Ward residents face in meeting health care needs, and I was pleasantly surprised and grateful for their openness.

Reporting on health issues is difficult with so many sticky privacy issues, and it's easy to hit brick walls in contacting clinics and medical practitioners. When I first contacted Craft-Kerney by phone a few days ago, however, she immediately began filling me in on the difficulties faced by her patients, and Berryhill didn't hesitate in agreeing to help me find patients who would share their stories.

Once I arrived in New Orleans, their willingness to help my job as a reporter became part of a bigger pattern. At the clinic, Craft-Kerney gestured to the waiting room, suggesting I speak to anyone there. The first man I spoke to answered my questions directly but warmly, as though I were his long-time neighbor; the next two women I interviewed spoke just as freely. I'm used to people needing a bit of cajoling or sometimes feeling a little uncomfortable, but there was none of that reticence here.

As I spoke to more people throughout the day and compared notes with a few of my colleagues, I decided that New Orleanians are friendly and open - as my past visits had shown true - but they also understand the media and its positive potential. Unlike people in any other place I reported, they welcome journalists and appreciate the good it can do to tell their stories. This discovery was not only refreshing but also somewhat reassuring. People here don't seem to harbor that automatic suspicion of journalists that can often makes our jobs tough, the same suspicion that sometimes makes me question my own motives. After a 55-year old woman told me about her depression and family problems, she said she felt better - and she looked better too, less tense. So often as a photographer and reporter, I feel like an intruder, but I really felt I had helped this woman by listening. Already, reporting here was different than any other place I've reported.