City Hall

Today was a short day, as it has been raining consistently since we left camp at 7 a.m. Our team had to be at the Camp for Coast Care by 7:30 this morning to receive our team's assignment for the day. Due to the rain, we weren't able to start work on a home, so we were sent to spend time with Lou who works for City Hall in Pass Christian (Kris-tea-anne). City Hall is still running out of a trailer, with a handmade sign. They are hoping construction on their prior location will be done within a year. Half of our team started by assisting the city in picking up trash alongside a busy rode. Some of the trash is obviously just litter, but other items are also clearly debris that is still there. While they started working on the side of the rodes, Jessica and I started assisting two elderly neighbors move debris, mainly consisting of bricks from their backyard to their curb for the city to pick up. (Note, Jessica is a sophomore at Wisc. Lacrosse, but she grew up in DSM and she graduated from Roosevelt!).

At lunch, Jessica and I returned to City Hall prior to the rest of the group, and we ended up speaking to the town's Mayor, Chipper McDermott (Note: I read last week about how all the area Mayor's are retiring or not running for re-election, because of "Katrina-fatigue") He was very enthusiastic and appreciative, and after our group finished with lunch, he asked us if we would let him show us around the town! So, we hopped in our van and we got to hear some great stories and hear about what famous people from around the world have visited or currently own a home in the area. We also went inside the largest oyster processing plant in the US (It smelled like it too). It was raining throughout our tour and when we returned to City Hall we decided to go back out to continue picking up trash for a couple hours. Even though it was raining, our group had a lot of fun and perfected what we called the "poke and bag".

We are hoping the rain will clear up so tomorrow we can start working on a more specific project.

Read the UW ASB blog here.