Seeing children play lets Capt. Robin Hackbarth know the evacuees from Gulf Coast hurricanes are going to be all right.

Hackbarth of the Muskogee Salvation Army has been deployed to help with hurricane relief.

Hackbarth received a phone call from her divisional headquarters in Oklahoma City this week and left Wednesday for Fort Chaffee, Ark.

“There are a lot of children here,” she said. “We gave them toys to play with, and now that it’s sunny outside they can play. It’s real sweet to see that the kids are OK.”

This isn’t the first time she has helped with hurricane relief.

“My parents were Salvation Army officers in Houma, La., when Hurricane Andrew went through there, and I helped with that when I was young,” she said.

Hackbarth sees her work as an opportunity to do a good deed for others that she has seen others do.

“I’m from the South, and I’ve been through hurricanes,” she said. “Now I’m able to help people in a similar situation. My family was in Mississippi when Katrina went through. So many people helped them; it’s good to be able to give back.”

Hackbarth is responsible for coordinating volunteers and delivering meals to people who can’t get to the dining hall because they are sick or handicapped.

“I get the names of people coming in, and I try to recruit through other agencies,” she said. “The volunteers are from both inside Arkansas and outside the state. Some of them are church groups, and some are from other organizations. Some are just people who wanted to help. I let the people in charge know who they have available.”

The evacuees seem to be doing fairly well, Hackbarth said.

“I think most people are in good spirits,” she said. “Of course, they want to go home. But for being away from home, they’re doing well.”

Capt. John Robbins with the Salvation Army at Fort Chaffee said there are approximately 2,274 evacuees housed there.