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A new use for an old school
Old Moss Bluff Middle turning into housing facility for volunteers
BY SARAH YOKUBAITIS AMERICAN PRESS
Billie Jean Bauer has always wanted to open a bed and-breakfast. But the old
Moss Bluff Middle School — long empty and the frequent target of vandals —
was not the ideal setting she had pictured.
“I never dreamed it would be anything like this. Who would have thought a
school could be a bed-and-breakfast?” she said, laughing as she glanced
around the school’s hastily converted office.
Bauer is the director of Partners in Prayer and Service, one of the many faith
based groups that have been helping to rebuild Southwest Louisiana since
Hurricane Rita. Its current project is to renovate the old middle school into a
housing facility for other volunteer groups staying in the area.
“Our housing facility will be the first like it in Southwest Louisiana. We turned
away hundreds of volunteers because there’s no place to house them. This
facility is key to our recovery,” Bauer said. “What we need is money,
manpower and materials. We’re going to provide the manpower for housing
initiative projects.”
Despite the building’s current state of disarray, a dozen volunteers from
AmeriCorps are staying in the half-finished school while they work on homes in
Cameron Parish.
“As far as housing goes, it’s essential. We wouldn’t be here without it,” said
AmeriCorps team leader Caroline Kondratenko. “This project is going to allow
the volunteer work to continue.”
At the urging of the United Way, PIPS asked the Calcasieu Parish School
Board for permission to use the old building for volunteers. They received
approval in May, and began working on it around Memorial Day.
Volunteers have come from as far away as Colorado. Many of them said the
pictures they saw on the news did not prepare them for the level of
devastation in Southwest Louisiana.
“On our first day, we passed a marsh, and a house was sitting in it. That was
pretty wild,” said AmeriCorps volunteer John Berger.
Others were moved by the resilience of the local community.
“You’re digging in the dirt and picking up people’s lives, yet they’re standing
there smiling, and giving us water and making sure we’re OK,” said
AmeriCorps volunteer Katie Howard of Tennessee.
This week PIPS was also joined by 75 teenagers from the Live Anew Catholic
Camp. The group is made up of volunteers from Georgia, Texas, New Jersey
and Wisconsin, along with a few from Our Lady Immaculate Church in
Jennings.
“It really impacts you a lot harder to see it in person. The news is different. It’s
really a lot worse here,” said 18-yearold Zach Briggs of Alpharetta, Ga.
“If only people knew how devastated the families are here. All they have is a
concrete slab where their lives used to be,” said Kondratenko.
But despite the bleakness of the situation, Bauer thinks PIPS has reached the
most rewarding phase in their cleanup efforts.
“We’re on the happy end of the rebuilding,” she said. “We get to send
volunteers to all the different housing initiatives and get to hear how people
are rebuilding their lives and their homes.”
Bauer believes that housing volunteers is more than just providing a basic
need.
“I might be able to help one family financially, but if I can bring in hundreds of
volunteers, we can change a community,” she said.
As for the future, Bauer is confident that the facility will bring more volunteers
to help the area recover from Hurricane Rita. “It’s kind of like the ‘Field of
Dreams’ baseball movie,” she said. “ ‘If you build it, they will come.’ ”
A group of teens work on removing years of dirt and rust from the outdoor
locker rooms. From left are, Rachel Horsh, Marcus High School in Lewisville,
Texas, Nikki Chochrek of Lewisville High School in Lewisville, Texas, Michael
Wallace of Marcus High in Highland Village, Texas, Amanda Smith, rear,
Hebron High School in Lewisville, Texas, Stephen Hall of Marcus High School
in Highland Village and Brady Pettit from Fire Mountain High in Fire Mountain,
Texas.
Brian Starks of Northview High School in Alpharetta, Ga. removes the rust off
of a pole.
