[StBernard] WP: Volunteers shoulder Katrina rebuilding

[Westley Annis]

WP: Volunteers shoulder Katrina rebuilding 
Charity groups, do-it-yourself efforts fill funding void in Gulf communities
By Peter Whoriskey
The Washington Post
Updated: 11:23 p.m. CT Jan 27, 2007

PEARLINGTON, Miss. - The two-by-fours inside the walls of George and
Margaret Ladner's new home are inscribed with biblical verses, each written
by one of the Alabama schoolchildren who raised money to buy the lumber.

The framing work on the house was done by a Christian from Pennsylvania, the
exterior planking was put up by people from Texarkana, Tex., and a group
from Destin, Fla., worked on other details.

"This home was built by the hands of God," Margaret Ladner, 75, said from
the couch of her new living room last week.

In this small rural community, as in much of the hurricane-ravaged
Mississippi Gulf Coast, this kind of motley charity effort accounts for the
vast bulk of what halting progress has been made in the immense task of
rebuilding.

Aid fails to reach many communities
While the national debate over the recovery has focused on the billions
expected in federal aid and insurance, those sources have so far provided
little for places such as Pearlington, and charity efforts have constituted
more than 80 percent of the home rebuilding completed so far, local and
charity officials said.

Fewer than one in five families here are back in their homes, but nearly all
of them have relied to some extent on charity groups. The waves of
volunteers typically come down for a week or two, work during the day and at
night sleep on cots and bunks set up in places such as the old school
library and huts on the community's football field.

"Without the volunteers and the donations, we'd still be in the mud," said
Rocky Pullman, a tugboat captain who represents the Pearlington area on the
Hancock County Commission.

In a county where nearly 11,000 homes were destroyed by the storm, the
largest single home rebuilder is the local Habitat for Humanity project,
which is undertaking the construction of 19 homes in the area, according to
an official with the governor's commission on recovery. Other groups are
aiming at similar numbers.

The reason for the charity's dominant role in the rebuilding is that little,
if any, of the $3.2 billion in federal aid for Mississippi homeowners has
reached anyone here -- it is tied up for now at the state level. As for
insurance, most residents of this rural community lacked any form of flood
policy. People say there just hadn't been a flood in recent memory, and of
those who did have coverage, most had too little.

"If it wasn't for the good American citizens coming here, we'd be in a world
of hurt," said Chuck Benvenutti, Hancock County representative on the
Governor's Commission on Recovery, Rebuilding, Renewal.


A mixed blessing
The fact that now, 17 months after Hurricane Katrina, only a small fraction
of the home rebuilding has been completed and that most of it has been done
by charity groups is viewed here as both wonderful and disappointing --
wonderful that so many strangers have arrived to help, but disappointing
that the federal aid and insurance payouts have proved, for now, so
unavailable.

The charitable groups and residents also say they sometimes worry that as
the rest of the country forgets about their plight, the flow of volunteers
that they have relied upon could shrink.

Several expressed outrage that there was no mention of the hurricane
recovery in President Bush's State of the Union address on Tuesday.

"We still look like a bomb hit us, and then the president in his national
address doesn't even mention us?" said Larry Randall, a retired boat captain
and a coordinator of relief efforts at the Pearlington Recovery Center.
"That really hurt."


Town nearly swept away 
Katrina made a nearly direct hit on this modest community, which once had
about 1,700 people, about 77 percent of them white, about 20 percent black,
census figures show. Most maintained houses -- a typical one sold for about
$50,000 before the storm -- and the rest had mobile homes.

Katrina pushed ashore a surge of water that simply washed many homes away
and filled others with as much as 10 feet of water, according to recovery
officials. Eight local people died. Several rode out the storm by climbing
tall trees and resting in their branches; others jumped from rooftops into
boats.

Now the vast majority of the residents who have returned live in FEMA
trailers, the skinny, 27-foot-long homes on wheels provided by the Federal
Emergency Management Agency that house families in cramped quarters. Along
the woodsy roadsides, hand-painted plywood signs offer community
encouragement -- "Keep Hope Alive" and "Katrina Was Big, God Was Bigger."
Stray dogs roam.

Everyone chipping in
Every week, scores of volunteers descend on this community to fill the cots
at the school library or the parsonage at the local Baptist Church or a camp
run by Presbyterians. Last week there were more than 80 here, but at other
times there have been as many as 200.

By day, they go out in work crews, framing houses, putting up drywall,
installing doors. At night, some have prayer meetings.

This past week, at various sites one could run into Amish from Pennsylvania,
Catholics from Massachusetts, Methodists from Illinois, Baptists from
Mississippi and a Florida church group. The Amish crews, clad in their
distinctive suspenders and wide-brimmed hats, have a non-Amish driver who
takes them to work sites.

"Many of us were born with a hammer in our hands," said Sam Stoltzfus, 41,
part of an Amish crew from the Williamsport, Pa., area. "This is fun. Yes,
we're supposed to help people, but it's not like a chain around our necks."

A change in plans
Russell Geeraerts, 38, a general contractor from Helena, Mont., said he came
down after the hurricane "for all the wrong reasons." He was going to
volunteer for a couple of weeks and then come back with his own work crew to
make some money.

"But then I asked myself, 'How could you?' " he said last week after lunch
at a local kitchen, which like the various camps was set up to serve
volunteers. "Just look at this place."

The $3.2 billion in federal aid disbursed by the Mississippi program has
largely been untouchable by people in Pearlington.

The program's first phase doles out money to people who were flooded but did
not live in the federally designated flood zone.

Most people in Pearlington live in the flood zone and must wait for the
second phase to begin. Under its guidelines, families of low and moderate
income will be eligible for as much as $100,000, less any insurance and FEMA
rebuilding payments they have received.

Learning to accept help from strangers
In the meantime, not knowing whether they will receive aid, many families
here say they have accepted, sometimes reluctantly, the help of the charity
groups in the rebuilding.

Many put what they have into building a foundation, getting the home
started. Then the charitable groups, which provide materials and work crews,
do the rest.

Even so, many feel uncomfortable about receiving the help.

Frank Bello and his wife, for example, are raising five children. He worked
in maintenance at the local elementary school. She is a nurse.

Last week, an Amish crew was putting together the frame on a new house for
the family.

Just before Christmas, when Bello was hauling three loads of dirt to his
home site, it began to rain. He told the volunteer work crew that he was
sorry that they had to work in such conditions.

"They said, 'Don't worry, we're glad to do it,' and that made me feel
better," Bello said. "But I still feel bad about it. Personally, myself, I
like to be doing that sort of thing for other people, not having them do it
for me. But now that's the way it is."

C 2007 The Washington Post Company
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16848353/


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