COUDERSPORT – When Lou Karija of Austin and three others from
Park United Methodist Church in Coudersport decided last November
to join Hurricane Katrina recovery assistance efforts
inðMississippi, they did not realize that some they would meet and
help down there would come north to visit them.

D. Ray Shavers of Mossport, Miss., is in the area with his wife
Maggie, daughter Brenda, 16, and a niece, visiting the man they now
call Uncle Lou, and the others they now think of as an extended
family. They will return to Mississippi today and are planning on
another visit at Thanksgiving.

On Sunday morning, Shavers told the congregation of Park United
Methodist something of what his family and countless others have
been going through in the months since Katrina.

He also told of how Karija and associates helped give the
Shavers back their home, even though the family still has a long
way to go, in recovering from Katrina’s ferocious attack.

The original team that went from the Coudersport area to
Mossport last November included the Rev. Mr. Dennis Adams, pastor
of Park United Methodist; Darryl Wright, who has a Master Clean
business; Andrea Turton, a nurse; and Karija.

They hooked up with some other volunteers in Hummelstown, where
Grace United Methodist Church had more volunteers ready to go, and
a bus with room for the Potter County crew. All told, the Potter
County volunteers were on the road 26 hours before the group
reached the area where they would be working.

Once they reached Mossport,ðthe volunteers Karija was with
pitched in to pitch out what had to be removed from the water
soaked, wind pummeled houses in Mossport.

Karija, a director of Public Works for Coudersport Borough and a
former construction contractor, worked in seven different homes
back then. At Shavers’ house, which was no longer habitable, the
volunteers first “took out their belongings and threw them into a
ditch, so the Army Corps of Engineers could come and take it all
away for disposal.”

The volunteers had to wear respiratory protection because of the
hazardous materials they might encounter, and the presence of toxic
mold growing in the moisture. Meanwhile, some area residents who
had no other shelter were living in mold infested homes.

Some homes were soaked as high as 12 feet in the interior, while
others had been flooded to about three feet. Dry wall (sheet rock)
had become wet wall, and was ruined. It followed the damaged
furnishings into the ditch.

The Shavers family (mom and dad and three children) have a
one-story home that received three feet of flood water. Everything
was ruined, up to that level, and some materials above that had to
go too, what with mold and other contamination.

On Aug. 29, the five Shavers were crowded into Maggie’s mother’s
three bedroom home with other suddenly homeless relatives, making a
total of 16 persons who lived together until a FEMA trailer finally
became available after Christmas.

The Shavers have been in that trailer ever since. It is not a
mobile home, but a recreation vehicle, about 20 feet by 7 feet.

“The bathroom is so small you can’t shut the door when you go
in,” Ray said. The family members take turns sleeping on the bunk
beds and sofa, so that everyone gets occasional turns sleeping on
something less uncomfortable than the small bunks.

The other family members are Donald, 18, who graduated from high
school last month and will soon head for Pensacola, Fla., to study
for a career in music ministry, and Darren, 17, who will be a high
school senior come September.

The boys are tall, Ray said, and they have had the hardest time
maneuvering in the camper.

By January, Ray was able to call Karija to report that $1,000
had been provided through a church fund, and new drywall was
available for installation.

Karija and his niece, Stephi Floulis, 19, of Pittsburgh, flew to
Mossport in February. There, Karija taught Stephi how to do drywall
finishing, using joint cement.

While doing their volunteer work, Karija and others lived in a
tent compound for CORE volunteers, at Ocean Springs, Miss.

Christians Organized for Relief Efforts was summoned into being
by the desperate situation faced by Katrina survivors.ð

The volunteers also looked around some in the Biloxi, Miss.,
area, where they found utter devastation in neighborhoods where
some residents had died, trapped as flooding topped 12 feet.

From there, they went to New Orleans, La., and saw the French
Quarter, which was far less damaged than some lower lying
areas.