Teens fix up homes

Program brings youths from afar to provide help

Diana Say, 16, of Stockton, makes sandwiches for her fellow teen campers at a Klamath work site. (The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

High-schoolers have been repairing roofs, putting up siding and building wheelchair ramps in Del Norte County this summer, but they’re not local.

Instead, these teens are from Central and Southern California and elsewhere on the West Coast.

Groups of about 45 teens, ages 14–18, will be rotating in and out of Klamath and Crescent City for one-week periods working on six houses for the Sierra Service Project (SSP).

SSP is a non-profit Christian organization that sends high-schoolers to primarily Indian reservations, but also urban areas, to fix up homes for those who need it. The organization also pays for supplies.

“It’s about empowering youth,” said Breea Laugalis, the site director, as a group of teens fixed a roof on Silverside Circle in Klamath this week.

“You can use a saw, you can use tools, you can put on a new roof,” she said.

It’s also a chance for teens to “discover who they are,” Laugalis said.

Diana Say, a 16-year-old from Stockton, said she heard from a former camper that “you can find yourself” at the summer camp by going out to a new place, meeting people and bonding with the team.

Becca Massek, a 13-year-old from Cameron Park, said she likes helping people. The camp is free of social groups and “everyone is equal,” which she also likes.

The weather here doesn’t hurt either, according to these girls, who hail from much warmer climates.

Cliff Moorehead of the Yurok Housing Authority, and Lauren Khvakos, 18, fix a roof. (The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

“I like the cooler weather,” Massek said.

Field trips to the beach are included. Say said they visited Clam Beach near McKinleyville.

“We don’t have that in Stockton,” Say said about beaches.

This is SSP’s first time on the Yurok reservation in Klamath  (the organization has to be invited to work on homes in an area). 

The homes were selected from the Yurok Indian Housing Authority, which also supplied contractors to help the teens, who are doing the work for free.

SSP looks for those with the greatest need, Laugalis said, such as the elderly and disabled. A leaking roof is also considered a priority because of the amount of rain Del Norte gets, she said.

Spiritual life coordinator Katie Barrett observes work. (The Daily Triplicate/Bryant Anderson)

They’re eating, sleeping and showering in Margaret Keating Elementary School and cooking their meals at the United Methodist Church.

Del Norte County Unified School District Superintendent Jan Moorehouse is supportive of the project.

“I think it’s one of the coolest things kids can do,” she said about community service work. “They come to a new environment and give back to a community. That kind of activity can be life-changing and empowering.”

A school is an appropriate place for the group to be sleeping and eating in, Moorehouse said, because the teens will learn not only a trade, but about themselves; things they may not achieve in a classroom.

Typically, a youth group —  including adult leaders — from a church applies for a service project and makes the trek together.

But once they arrive, youths are broken up into different teams to work on homes so they can “meet new people and branch out,” Laugalis said.

At the end of each day, everyone comes together for a spiritual session where the adults and teens talk about personal growth and growth with God, said Katie Barrett, the spiritual life coordinator.

“Service is a gift of love,” Barrett said, “not to receive something in return.”

Laugalis and Barrett were campers themselves.

Now in their early 20s, they said they wanted to have a summer job and still do meaningful work.

Barrett said that she wants to continue working with youth “forever.”

“High school is a neat age,” she said.

Laugalis, who just graduated from college, wants to work in non-profits.

“This the best job I’ve ever had,” she said.