2009
Photos
2009
(Link)
Now
for the Rest of the (Gulf Coast) Story
This an article published after the
return from the Gulf Coast by Scott
Brigante.
The hastily prepared segment for the SCOOP
gave you a mere snippet of what really
happened on our journey to the Gulf Coast.
Many people have been asking us about
the trip, so it’s a good time to give you a
more complete overview.
First and foremost, there wouldn’t have been
a Gulf Coast Group without Debbie Fournier and
Maria Vasilakos.
Debbie went last year and it was her
energy and enthusiasm that provided the
impetus to take another group this year.
Both she and Maria did most of the
critical planning and organizational legwork
to take this field trip from idea to reality.
As for the trip itself, Gulf Coast Group
members got up between 3:00 – 4:00AM to get
to T.F. Green airport in time to catch the
first flight out on Friday, April 17th.
Upon are arrival, we hit the ground
running and this is what our week looked like
(in approximate chronological order):
At the airport in New Orleans, one of our
group members was stricken with a stomach
virus (and we got him directly to our camp to
convalesce).
We were greeted by one of our project
managers, Chris, who gave the group a tour of
New Orleans.
The group traveled about an hour east
to Bay St. Louis and Mission on the Bay.
Mission on the Bay is a camp for
volunteers providing food, shelter, and
logistical support to the Hurricane Katrina
relief work.
Everyone settled in after a very long
day of traveling.
We started work the next morning and worked
for six straight days on the following
projects:
We landscaped a yard for an elderly gentleman
who had recently had his home (near the beach
on the Gulf of Mississippi) rebuilt.
While the man wasn’t home at the
time, a few of us ran into him the next day
and he was very grateful to us for doing work
that he was unable to do himself.
We cleared debris from a catholic cemetery in
a traditionally African American parish.
This job included some heavy lifting,
as there was concrete debris in the pile we
were assigned to.
This took a couple of hours. We drove
to a jetty on the Gulf and dumped the clean
concrete there to reinforce the structure.
We prepared an abandoned building lot for the
removal of construction and demolition debris
(also known as “C&D”).
This required moving a large pile of
lumber (much of it rotted) from the back of
the lot out to the street.
We also cleared off the concrete slab
that the house stood on before the hurricane.
This required gathering loose bricks
and scraping linoleum tiles off of the cement.
During this job, the man across the street,
Mr. Ashton, brought doughnuts for us to eat
and shared his harrowing story of survival
with the group.
Mr. Ashton had to swim out of his house
and cling to a piece of furniture for 3 hours
during the height of the storm while his home
was destroyed.
We removed debris washed up on a beach on
Cowand Point in Bay St. Louis.
This included removing a very large
black tarp and a tank filled with sand.
Yes, we found a dead sea turtle that
had washed
up on the beach during a storm prior to
our arrival.
Our site manager had been asked by
state agencies to document the turtle’s
size, photograph the animal, and bury it so
that a collector could not poach its remains.
We did some yard work in the neighborhood of
our project manager, clearing brush and
working around his house as well as at other
home sites.
It was clear that our host spends a
great deal of time helping others and we were
happy to be able to help him so he could
continue doing his good work to rebuild the
community.
We visited the emergency operations center in
Bay St. Louis, a building that used to house
one of the first “separate but equal”
segregated black schools in Mississippi.
The building looked as if it had been
frozen in time at the moment the waters
receded from the hurricane 4 years ago.
It was dark and eerie and filled with a
hodge-podge of debris and emergency supplies
as well as some potential hazards.
We helped a woman whose list of misfortunes is
too long to list here.
Her replacement home had been built but
the remains of her FEMA shelter had to be
demolished or moved and debris cleared.
She was facing pressure from the town
to clear her property but she didn’t have
the means to take care of it.
We spent several hours working on the
site. The
homeowner came to the site to thank us
personally for taking the time to help her
out.
We drove to a home in Louisiana to paint a
barn structure that was under construction and
set large posts into the ground as a frame for
a chicken coop.
One of the interesting geological
aspects of the Gulf Coast is that there are
very few rocks in the ground – an alien
experience for native New Englanders!
On our last day of work, we split into two
groups. One
group drove to a home that had been rebuilt by
volunteers but needed a defective ceiling
replaced.
We pulled the old sheet rock ceiling
down and hung 9 new 4’ x 8’ sheets.
The other crew helped prepare the
grounds of Mission on the Bay and the Christ
Episcopal Church for a groundbreaking ceremony
to rebuild the sanctuary that was swept away
by the storm.
That crew also did some additional yard
work at other sites.
Along the way, the Gulf Coast group visited an
ancient Indian burial mound, took in a small
festival in the center of the still-struggling
Bay St. Louis.
We ate lunch twice under the shade of a
large “Shoo-fly” tree and in the shadow of
a ruined town hall.
We experienced the best of southern
cuisine and the worst of camp food.
We suffered bumps and bruises and
sickness (One student and one teacher were
stricken with a viral infection) and the
incredible swarms of biting bugs.
Through it all, the 15 young men and
women of Mansfield High School worked hard
every single day and made their 3 teacher
chaperones extremely proud.
There were a number of times when we
were stopped by local residents and thanked
for helping – even if we weren’t working
directly to help them.
They also told us their stories of
surviving the storm and the tangle of
paperwork and obstacles they face in
rebuilding their lives. It was a humbling
experience that none of us will ever forget.
We have so many people to thank for their
support. Let’s
start with you, our colleagues.
Through Dress Down Friday donations,
raffle sales (most of that income came from
teachers and staff) and individual monetary
and raffle item donations, the faculty and
staff of Mansfield Schools raised hundreds of
dollars to help us make this trip possible.
The families of the students in the
Gulf Coast Group was exceptionally supportive
and represent the kind of compassion and
caring that make Mansfield public school
students so special.
Our community business partners and
community organizations stepped up in a big
way to help fund the trip.
Sue Molinda and the health office staff
helped us prepare for any health situations
while we were on the road.
Mary Tierney did so much to support our
efforts that she will always be an honorary
member of the 2009 Gulf Coast Group and we
will always be grateful to her.
We thank Brenda Hodges, Joe Maruszczak,
and the School Committee for allowing us to
take this volunteer group to the Gulf Coast.
Last but not least, to our student
volunteers who gave their time and money to be
part of this journey.
They gave up a week of vacation to toil
in hot weather and unpleasant conditions.
They gave up part of themselves– a
group of diverse personalities - to work
together as a very effective team.
They came home with a new appreciation
and gratitude for the many comforts that we
take for granted.
They are; Jacqui Ahearn, Alex Barca,
Gwen Bibby, Jasmine Barros, Melissa Buchanan,
Duncan Fuller, Rachel Goldman, Michelle
Greene, Juliet Hooten, Emily Keohane, Brienn
McParland, Kevin Mutascio, Kirstin Ridlen,
Molly Sherer, Greg Szczesuil.
We packed so much into our week at the Gulf
Coast. It’s
impossible to cover it all.
Please feel free to ask any member of
the Gulf Coast Group about our trip.
Every chance we get to talk about this
amazing experience will give us the
opportunity to bring it back to life.
Stay tuned for photographs and a
display of artifacts as we continue to share
our stories . . .