LAUREL — Dr. John Harper, deputy superintendent of the Laurel School District, said Hurricane Katrina made many take a reality check and to think about what a lot of people took for granted.

“Before Katrina, we always thought the ATM would work, but when the power is out, the ATM doesn’t work,” Harper said. “The grocery lines and gas lines were long. To see people standing in lines stretched from the front door of Wal-Mart to 16th Avenue, and waiting for hours to get ice at the distribution locations made you think.”

Harper said he remembers sitting in the EOC (Emergency Operations Center) briefing room that Sunday night “to hear Don McKinnon say the hurricane had turned toward us. I knew then it was going to be bad.”

The deputy superintendent said the storm surprised many.

“It was right at the beginning of football season and there was a lot of excitement about the season. I remember Mr. (Elvin) Ulmer was doing some special things to the field to make it extra nice for the Hattiesburg High game,” Harper recalled. “After Katrina, to see the scoreboard just hanging and light poles everywhere was something.”

Harper said the it took him three days of trying to get to Mason Elementary School.

“I was just trying and trying again to get to Mason Elementary before the roads were cleared. Every day I would try a different route until I was finally able to get to the school on the third day,” he said. “When we were able to get as many of our central office staff, maintenance staff and principals together, we began to assess the damages. We rode a bus around Laurel assessing damage to our schools.

Harper said damages to the Laurel School District’s facilities were estimated at approximately $2 million. The damages included the following:

• Lost roof at Laurel High School gym, causing extensive water damage, buckling the gym floor.

• Lost stadium lights and fence at Laurel High School’s R.H. Watkins Stadium

• The district spent $75,000 renovating the Maddox building gym for the alternative school. When the renovations were only three years old, Katrina came through. The building lost its roof, all books, electronic equipment and carpet damaged.

• Gym roof at Nora Davis Magnet School blew off and landed on building three, causing extensive water damage to the exposed gym and damages to building three.

• Water damage in gym and classrooms at Oak Park Elementary

• Trees down across the district

• Damage to the roof on the Gardiner Administrative Building and Stewart M. Jones Building,

• Carpet damaged in the vocational center at LHS, and

• Water damage throughout the entire district.

“Our first few ballgames were played on Saturdays in the mid afternoon, since we didn’t have lights. The games were well attended, and brought the students back together,” he said. “After Katrina hit, people were just in shock and saying, ‘can you believe this just happened.’ People were just trying to find out what their next steps should be. ...Everything just went into survival mode.”

Harper said he particularly liked the cooperative spirit that the event brought about.

“What I will always remember was people helping people — sharing ice, sharing food, making sure your neighbors had necessities,” he said. “It didn’t matter who you were before the storm, everybody needed each other after the storm.

“It took the collective effort of many people coming together to get many people through,” the deputy superintendent added. “People you didn’t even know came together and shared.”

Harper said the school district also pitched in. He said a Laurel School District bus and bus driver took patients to dialysis treatments and the Laurel High School parking lot served as an ice distribution location.

Bringing some stability back to the community was important.

“Our superintendent stressed that we have to get the children back in school to provide a sense of stability for the students,” he remembered. “The ultimate goal after Katrina was to make our schools stable enough to bring children in.

“Not only were we making it right at our homes, we were making it right for our students,” he remembers. “We came together as a team, worked with the city and others to secure our buildings. We were out of school for approximately nine days.”

Harper said the school district was “fortunate that it wasn’t worse than it was, and we were able to get children back in school as soon as we did. I’m sure it took some of the pressure off the parents to do some things at home they needed to do.”

He said after all that happened “the Laurel School District came back better than we were before.”

“In a time of crises it’s not first about me, or you; it’s about us,” Harper said. “The Emergency Operations Center did an amazing job of keeping us informed before and after the storm. I can't forget them, and their work. That building and the people paid dividends to this community.”