Left Homeless, but Not Without Friends

By ERIKA CHAVEZ

Feb. 27, 1998 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

LAGUNA BEACH —

In times of need, this community is used to pulling together.

It can be a small gesture, like Tangerine Bolen’s co-workers pooling their money to buy her and her boyfriend, Michael Shahoud, toiletries and underwear. Their apartment was destroyed in Monday night’s deadly mudslide.

Or, it can be a big gesture. Brett Daly offered an apartment adjacent to his house to neighbor Pat Hart, whose home was almost buried in mud.

“She said she didn’t need it but I offered it to her anyway, and she decided to take me up on it,” Daly said as he shoveled mud out to the road in front of his auto repair shop on Laguna Canyon Road.

“You just do what you can for people during these times,” he said matter-of-factly. All around him, bulldozers beeped and rattled industriously, trying to make a dent in the wall of mud that destroyed several homes.

Laguna Beach, a city known for art galleries and breathtaking views of the Pacific, has always been brave and generous in the face of devastation. Through floods, fires and mudslides, residents have rebuilt their lives and living spaces by helping each other.

“I’ve been through it all,” Daly said, recalling the floods in 1982 and ‘83, which he called “worse than any of this.” He works in the Big Bend area of the canyon and lives in town, closer to the beach.

Daly recalled watching aerial shots of the area on the news and realizing that the mudslide barely missed his auto shop.

“I felt like I was on somebody’s good side,” he said. “So I’m trying to help out however I can.”

Next door to Daly’s auto shop, an unidentified woman endured the mud to climb up to Glenn Alan Flook’s house. Flook was killed in Monday’s mudslide.

“Have you seen a white Himalayan cat?” she called out to neighbors. “Glenn had a cat and it hasn’t been fed. No one knows where it is.”

For some, helping out is a way to cope with the turmoil.

Bolen has spent every day since the mudslide on the telephone and out in the streets, looking for shelter and donations for those who lost their homes.

“Mike and I are homeless,” Bolen, 27, said. “We have his car and the clothes on our backs. But then I think of the families with children that were displaced, and I realize they’re worse off. It’s scary not having somewhere to go home to.”

Sande St. John said a kind of guilt inspired her to organize a community relief effort at Laguna Club for Kids, where she is director.

“You feel so bad, almost ashamed, that it wasn’t you,” St. John said. “You ask yourself, ‘Why them? Why not me?’ It’s heartbreaking.”

An 11-year resident, St. John called Laguna Beach “an incredible community. People here are always so willing to help.”

Back at Big Bend, Kirk Davis and his brother-in-law, Sean Schleuter, spent Thursday morning trying to get into Davis’ mud-filled house to retrieve any possessions that weren’t destroyed. Davis and his girlfriend, Debra Ripley, were driven out of their rented cottage.

Davis worked in silence, moving slowly but deliberately.

“He’s still in shock about all this,” Schleuter said. “He and Debra have been staying at a hotel, but they will come to our house for the next few days.

“That’s what family is for,” he said.

Times staff writer David Reyes also contributed to this report.

Erika Chavez can be reached at (714) 966-5977. Her e-mail address is erika.chavez@latimes.com.

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How to Help

If you would like to make a donation to flood, mudslide or other disaster victims:

Make cash donations to:

The American Red Cross

P.O. Box 11364

Santa Ana, CA 92711-1364

Donate clothing or household goods at:

* American Red Cross, Orange County Chapter