Invisible People

'Like We're Invisible'
Katrina cut off an already isolated rural Mississippi, so residents helped one another.

By Elizabeth Mehren, Times Staff Writer

VANCLEAVE, Miss. — April Smith said she woke up the day after Hurricane Katrina hit and heard God telling her to clean out her closet. With no relief trucks headed toward this tiny town about 15 miles northeast of Biloxi, Smith gathered a bagful of garments — some that still fit her two young children — to distribute on her own."People around here lost everything," said Smith, 30. "And they were not getting the attention they needed."

Rural Mississippi residents joined forces when outside help failed to appear after the disaster, which killed at least 219 across the state, caused billions of dollars in damage, and devastated coastal cities and inland hamlets with fierce winds and 30-foot tidal surges.About 1.6 million people, more than half the state's population, live in Mississippi's rural areas.

Of those, 21.1% live below the U.S. poverty line of $21,180 annually for a family of five. The national poverty average is 11.9%.Isolated and poor, many in this state said they felt neglected, especially by the federal government.

No military convoys rumbled in to lend calm; no National Guard members came through to hand out ice and water. No officials arrived to set up shelters. Large charities and private insurance companies also overlooked them, residents said.So they took matters into their own hands.

Robert Williams tried to contact the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the county about removing two 60-foot pine trees that threatened his mother's home here.

No one responded, so Williams borrowed a chain saw and brought the trees down on his own.After a while, the 32-year-old church janitor got through to FEMA.

"They gave us a case number and said someone would be out as soon as possible," he said, standing beside the fallen trees, which crushed a utility shed. "We have no idea when that will be.

"Half a mile away, James Meeks, 54, found a large portion of his mobile home's roof in a tree, crumpled like an accordion. Meeks' wife, Betty, 57, called FEMA to find out about emergency compensation.

"To be honest, it has taken FEMA quite a while to get back to us," she said. "I called them more than 10 days ago, and they said they would be right out. Nobody has come yet.

"James Meeks hauled out a ladder and crafted a makeshift roof. He worked without electricity, which did not return to his neighborhood until two weeks after the hurricane.

"We're just out in the country, and it takes longer to get to us," Betty Meeks said. "But then, it's also easy to forget about us out here."

Lea Stokes, spokeswoman for the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency, said that relief efforts in rural areas had been complicated and sometimes not as prompt as residents would have liked because of the scope of the disaster."Katrina went through our entire state," she said. "We had to set up distribution centers [for food and other supplies] in 73 out of 82 counties in Mississippi. So it was very overwhelming."

Pete Smith, spokesman for Gov. Haley Barbour, said Department of Transportation crews had been working their way across the state to clear roads and restore power. He acknowledged that "in rural Mississippi, it is sometimes harder to get to them."At the Mississippi Development Authority, spokesman Scott Hamilton said officials were concerned about economic hardships in rural sections of the state.

He said his agency planned to open business assistance centers throughout Mississippi. But he said his best advice was for people to "help themselves."Like Vancleave, many of these small towns lie in Mississippi's heavily wooded inland region, up to 25 miles from the coast.

Humble houses and aging mobile homes often are accessible only by dirt roads. One rural community, Moss Point, had the added headache of roaming alligators, escapees from an alligator farm that flooded during the storm.Yet winding roads and marauding reptiles did not deter a small group of volunteers that traveled to the area from rural Georgia.

Devan Voyles said he cleaned out his bank account and loaded a truck with supplies, figuring that the hurricane could just as easily have walloped his area. He enlisted a dozen helpers, dubbing their effort Northeast Georgia Disaster Relief.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-rural19sep19,0,4319997.story