The Jackson Sun from Jackson, Tennessee • 7

Friday, September 2, 2005 FROM THE COVERLOCAL The Jackson Sun7A Emergency decree here in Tennessee? State's gas at $3 per gallon James Vincent fills up two extra gas cans Thursday at a BP gas station on U.S. 45 in Chester County. 'There are some things we can do if we declare a fuel but we're not there said Gov. Phil Bredesen. KATIE MORGANThe Jackson Sun The Associated Press NASHVILLE Gov.

Phil Bredesen has requested a federal emergency declaration for Tennessee in order to assist thousands of refugees who came to the state from devastated areas in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. "I have determined that this incident is of such severity and magnitude that effective response is beyond the capabilities of the state and the affected local governments, and that supplementary federal assistance is necessary to save lives, protect property, public health and safety," Bredesen wrote Thursday in a letter to President Bush. More than 10,000 evacuees are estimated to be staying just in Memphis following the storm, many of them in hotels. Bredesen said these evacuees' funds for lodging would soon be exhausted, and that Tennessee will open 10 different shelters to house them. Katrina plunges college students' plans into limbo To report price gouging near you Call the Tennessee Division of Consumer Affairs at (800) 342-8385 or go online to www.

tennessee.govconsumer. On the Net: www.aaasouth.com, AAA Auto Club South Sun and wire reports Gasoline prices surged past the $3 per gallon mark Thursday in much of Tennessee, with shortages causing some gas stations to close temporarily as one of the nation's busiest travel weekends approached. Gas retailers in Tennessee have not been overrun with long lines of panicked motorists as in other states. But fears of widespread gas shortages had many frustrated drivers topping off their tanks and filling up gas containers Thursday just in case gas supplies take a nosedive over the Labor Day weekend. In Jackson, Lonnie Rice, 26, said he went to a Texaco station on South Highland because he thought it would be cheaper.

"Now, it looks like it's the same price everywhere you go," Rice said. "I got seven gallons for $21. You know that's bad. It's ridiculous. You'll see people walking out here before too long.

I'm quite sure they (gas stations) will (run out of gas)." Gas station owners agree with Rice: they could have a shortage soon if they don't receive supplies. Ash Amir, owner of the BP station at 1129 S. Highland said there is a very good chance that the station might run out of gas. "What I've been told today by suppliers is that they have had to cut 20 percent of the load," Amir said. He said his station would probably not receive another supply of gasoline for five days.

If he out of regular unleaded and selling only premium grade. "It's just a precaution. I don't think there's been a big run on gas yet. But there could be later." The average price across the state Thursday hovered between $3 and $3.15 per gallon, according to AAA Autoclub South, which monitors gas prices in Florida, Georgia and Middle and West Tennessee. AAA East Tennessee reported prices that ranged from $2.89 to $3.25 for regular unleaded gas in a spot check Thursday of about 30 stations across Knoxville, spokesman Don Lindsey said.

Gov. Phil Bredesen said Thursday he will likely ask state employees and Tennesseans to cut back on nonessential travel this weekend. "This is a good weekend to have your neighbors over for a hot dog roast instead of traveling," Bredesen said. At a news conference Thursday, Bredesen said "the phone has been ringing off the hook" at his office with calls about gas prices. Bredesen said there is no severe supply shortage in Tennessee right now and most gas shortage problems so far have been in Shelby County.

doesn't receive it by then, he won't have any gasoline to sell. "The price is not the issue," Amir said. "It's getting the product. It'll be hard to get the product. I hope it's temporary." Joe B.

Warren, co-owner of Warrens' Bonwood Exxon at 1911 S. Highland said his gas prices, which range from $2.98 a gallon to $3.18 a gallon, have increased about 50 cents. But he should have enough gasoline to sell until Saturday. "I'll be out of gas (if trucks don't arrive)," Warren said. "But, I haven't been told I couldn't get it." "You might as well have a little extra," said John Barrett, who filled two 2-gallon containers at a Brentwood gas station, which was I low to help Many organizations are offering help to victims of Hurricane Katrina.

If your organization or business is collecting items for the victims, and you would like the information listed in the newspaper, please send it to Debbie Morris at debmorrisjacksonsun.com, or call 425-9657 Monday through Friday. For church listings, call Wendy Isom at 425-9782 or send an e-mail to wisomjacksonsun.com. National nonprofits collecting money (specify donations are for Hurricane Katrina relief) American Red Cross, (800) HELP-NOW, Spanish (800) 257-7575, redcross.org P.O. Box 37243, Washington, D.C. 20013 The Salvation Army, (800) SAL-ARMY, salvationarmy.org P.O.

Box 4857, Jackson, MS 39296-4857 United Way, (800) 272-4630, unitedway.org P.O. Box 630568, Baltimore, MD 21263-0568 More relief organizations are listed at fema.gov and nvoad.org. If you are making your donation by check, make a notation on your check that you want your donation to go to Hurricane Katrina recovery. Also check with your employer about matching funds. Information on loved ones Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, (225) 925-7500.

For information on missing persons, call (225) 925-6626. Alabama Emergency Management Agency, (205) 280-2200. For Mississippi, call (601) 960-9013, (601) 352-9100, or the 24-hour emergency help line at (800) 222-6362. FEMA recommends that people call the Red Cross for information on loved ones who may have entered a shelter or received Red Cross assistance. Find a local Red Cross office at (866) GET-INFO or www.redcross.orgwherewhere.html.

You also can post messages about people missing in New Orleans at www.nola.com. Local shelter West Jackson Baptist Church, 580 Oil Well Road, is a relief shelter for victims of Hurricane Katrina. There are 35 people at the church, and more are expected. They could use the following donations: bottled water, toiletries, new towels, new wash cloths and new twin-size sheets, razors, small diapers and individual snacks. They are not accepting used clothing or household items.

Most positions for volunteers at the shelter are filled, but more volunteers may be needed on Tuesday. Call 512-3810. Fill the truck From 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. today, donations will be taken in a truck located between the Student Union Building and the fountain on Union University's campus.

Items needed include hygiene products and ready-to-eat, individually wrapped food items. Bottled water is the most pressing need. Collected items will be delivered to the shelter at West Jackson Baptist. Union also will do a door-to-door collection drive for those items throughout North Jackson on Saturday. Dinner for refugees Carl Jones, of Premier Place Catering, will provide a dinner at 5 p.m.

today for families from the Gulf Coast regions of Alabama, Louisiana or Mississippi seeking refuge in Jackson. Please call 660-2410 if you plan to attend, or would like to volunteer to help. Donations and items collected Jackson City Councilman John Bannister is teaming up with the local Red Cross Chapter and Eagle 104.1 FM to help out Louisiana and Mississippi evacuees. From 10 a.m. until 5 p.m.

today at the Nextel store, 843 North Parkway, donations of money, bottled water, new blankets and pillows will be collected for Hurricane Katrina refugees in Jackson. Collections will continue from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. Saturday. Organizers plan to load up an 18-wheeler full of donations.

Volunteering in affected areas According to fema.gov, volunteers should not report directly to the affected areas unless directed by a disaster relief agency. Self-dispatched volunteers can put themselves and others in harm's way and hamper rescue efforts. According to the state Web site, the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency needs volunteers to help victims, but you must get storm credentials before heading to the disaster area. To volunteer, contact TEMA at (615) 741-1496 or (615) 741-0343, or visit www.tnema.org for more information. Medical supplies To donate medical supplies or equipment, contact the Tennessee Department of Health, Emergency Medical Services at (800) 778-4505 or (615) 741-6882.

Refugee services and benefits The Tennessee Department of Human Services and TEMA are coordinating assistance for Katrina refugees from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Refugees may be entitled to food stamps and other federal benefits under the National Refugee Policy. If you are seeking these benefits, go to the nearest DHS office or work through local aid workers and TEMA officials. To find the nearest DHS office, visit www. tennessee.govhumanservstmap.htm.

The Social Security Administration Is doing everything it can to ensure monthly payments get to beneficiaries affected by Hurricane Katrina. For more information on the nearest open Social Security office, you can call (800)772-1213. Displaced students For K-12 inquiries, contact the Homeless Education Program at (615) 532-6314 at the Tennessee Department of Education, www.tennessee.goveducation. For higher education inquiries, contact the University of Memphis, Office of Admissions at (800) 669-2678. They will serve as the facilitator for the Board of Regents schools and the University of By PETE WICKHAM pwickhamjacksonsun.com Nothing like your first weekend at college.

Weeks of anticipation. Packing. Travel. Unpacking. Meeting the roommate.

Getting those first warm words of welcome from your new school followed by a "please leave Now!" Not what any school advertises in its guidebook but then this wasn't any weekend that any school in and around New Orleans had ever been through before. And because of it, and the fury of Hurricane Katrina, six graduates of University School of Jackson's Class of 2005 are back home, or with friends, while their college career is on what could be indefinite hold. For Caroline Reed, Margaret Jaco and Tyler Smallwood, the career is at six hours and holding. They arrived Saturday morning at Tulane for move-in, got their gear into their rooms and then were asked to go to the auditorium for a 1 p.m. meeting.

There, they were told that New Orleans had been put under mandatory evacuation orders. "We knew that a hurricane might be coming Thursday or Friday, and that Saturday we knew it was coming, and that it was kind of serious," Caroline Reed said. "A lot of times it hadn't been a big deal, but this time it turned out it was. I spent about 10 minutes meeting my roommate, then they just told us to get out and they had no idea when they were going to start up again." Two of their USJ classmates Jayme Hogan-Yarbro and Michael Anton had spent less than 24 hours in their dorms at nearby Loyola-New Orleans when they got the bug-out order. And Jordan Phillips had finished her first week of classes up the road at LSU in Baton Rouge.

As with almost everything else in storm-ravaged Louisiana, academic life is on hold. On Thursday, Tulane's senior officials had set up temporary shop in Houston, with only a core of public safety and facilities officials left to tend to a campus that suffered some damage, but was in much better shape than the rest of the city. "I'm pretty bummed, but I've got to use my time now productively," said Reed, a pre-med major who may do work for her mother's marketing firm, volunteer at a local medical facility and possibly audit a class or two at Union University while she waits word on what might happen. "It doesn't do you any good to dwell on it." Mary Reed said her daughter "is committed to riding it out and going back to Tulane. We'll get through this." Smallwood, who will major in biology looking towards a medical career, said, "you feel bad.

You have to put freshman on hold, and you're excited but for us this isn't the end of the world. We're surviving and we still have what we have. There are so many people down there who need help immediately." He's hoping to be able to go back when it's possible with a volunteer group through his church to help with cleanup and recovery. "I want to try and help out," he said. "My situation is frustrating, but it's nothing compared to everything the people there have to deal with." Bill Smallwood said his son "stays tuned in with the TV and the computer." Tulane puts up twice-daily messages on an emer State schools to accept students The University of Tennessee Martin will join other schools in the UT and Tennessee Board of Regents systems in accepting students from colleges hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina, according to a press release.

The state's public colleges will find places for undergraduate, graduate, professional and medical students. Eligible students won't pay tuition or housing costs if they've already paid them at their schools. If they have not paid tuition at their schools, they will pay the in-state rate. UTM can accept 50 students and has housing available for 25. If demand exceeds the available space, the university will re-assess the situation.

The University of Memphis Office of Admissions will serve as the facilitator for both Board of Regents schools and the University of Tennessee, according to the state's Web Site. Call (800) 669-2678. The number for the University of Tennessee Martin is 881-7500. excited," Bill Smallwood said of the youngest of his three children. "We were so excited we were thinking of putting our house up for sale here and building on property we have at Gulf Shores, to be closer to him." Phillips, an architecture major, said one week of classes "has given me plenty of projects to keep me busy while we figure out what was going to happen next." She drove up Interstate 55 last Saturday.

"We would see cars with Louisiana tags stuffed with everything they could pack on top, and in the back of the car," Phillips said. "By the time we got to Memphis, we stopped and there was nothing but Louisiana cars all around us." Debbie Anton had just left son Michael at Loyola on Friday as he prepared to start his studies as a music business major. "Had him all unpacked, he was ready for that stage of his life and by 10 a.m. the following morning, he's leaving with his laptop, a couple of T-shirts and a couple of pairs of shorts. "Everything he has is in his fourth-floor dorm room," said Debbie Anton, whose son is visiting friends at the University of Tennessee Knoxville this weekend.

"It should be OK from flooding. But there was a big tree outside. And we haven't seen any footage or heard anything from Loyola to know what's happened." She said that when her son gets back, "we've got to sit down and make some big decisions. Do we enroll him in classes at Jackson State, or head another direction? We don't want him to lose the entire semester." Hogan-Yarbro's parents were able to quickly get Jayme into Rhodes College in Memphis, where she will be a voice performance major. Pam Jaco said her daughter, Margaret, will be switching from Tulane (where she planned to major in psychology) to Rhodes.

Like her USJ mates, however, Jaco has the same problem. "All her clothes are still back in the dorm room at Tulane, and it will be that way for a while." Visit talkback.jacksonsun.com and share your thoughts. Pete Wickham, 425-9668 I 'K W' A -I I NED HUNTERThe Jackson Sun Tony Morris, left, and Jose Oropeza, right, of JEA, load a generator into Morris' truck to be taken to his to Collins, home. 'People are getting desperate' It took Miss, couple 15 hours and a trip to Jackson to find 2 generators gency Web site. "I feel bad for him, because he was so create power.

Tony and Peggy also were able to secure another generator, on loan and without cost, from the Jackson Energy Authority. "These people need help, and we are a community company, even if that community extends into Mississippi," said Jose Oropeza, while helping Tony Morris load the generator into the back of his white Toyota pickup. The Morrises, who by now should be back in Collins, consider themselves lucky. "Our home is fine," said Peggy Morris. "Our big oak tree blew down, but it just missed our roof by about five feet." With the hurricane past, the couple's worries have turned from surviving the raging storm, to surviving each new day.

"We won't be able to take enough back this trip," said Tony Morris, "but we can take enough to get by for a while. But I am afraid as conditions get worse, people will start to break into people's homes." Visit talkback.jacktnnsun.com and shareyour thoughts. Ned Hunter, 425-9641 was restored to hospitals," Tony Morris said. "People are getting desperate." It was that desperation that pushed Tony and Peggy to temporarily abandon their home, family and friends Wednesday evening and drive more than 15 hours through four states, searching for a generator, fuel and bottled water. The couple stopped in almost 10 towns before finally finding an affordable power source in Jackson on Thursday afternoon at Murphy Tractor Co.

on Airways Boulevard. Libby Murphy contacted Don Bailey, of Four Seasons Nursery Home and Garden Showplace, who sold the couple his emergency PTO generator at cost. "(Tony) told me to add whatever I wanted, but I'd been there before, and know what they were going through, so I gave it to them at cost," Bailey said. "I just want to be able to replace it." A PTO generator is a "power take off generator. It is connected to the driv-elrain of tractor with an attachment that turns the generator to By NED B.

HUNTER nhunterjacksonsun.com It wasn't Hurricane Katrina's nearly 100 mph winds that forced Tony and Peggy Morris to temporarily abandon their Collins, home and drive to Jackson it was desperation. When Katrina tore through Collins, about 30 miles north of Hat-tiesburg, it left nothing but destruction in its wake. "There's no power, no water, no phones and no food," said Peggy Morris. "The windows were blown out at the IGA (grocery store), and it was looted; and people took all the ice and meats." While the situation in New Orleans continues to receive national attention, Tony Morris said his secluded town of Collins also is struggling to survive. governor (Haley Barbour) said (Wednesday) it would be at least two weeks before electricity Mm ft Submitted photo.

Six graduates of the University School of Jackson had just started college In Louisiana when Hurricane Katrina hit..