Katrina has claimed many victims &045; but brought one economic bright spot to southwest Mississippi Friday.

Georgia-Pacific announced it will reopen its dormant mills in Roxie and Gloster to salvage and process timber knocked to the ground by the hurricane. The reopening will bring 500 jobs to the region.

The plywood plant in Gloster and the sawmill in Roxie closed about three years ago because of high production costs, Georgia-Pacific’s chairman and chief executive officer, A.D. &uot;Pete&uot; Correll, said Friday. About 3,500 people already work at the company’s 20 plants in Mississippi.

Correll said after Katrina struck Aug. 29, he called Barbour and asked if the company could help in Mississippi’s recovery.

&uot;I said, ‘What do you really need?’ And he said, ‘We need jobs,’&uot; Correll said.

Forestry specialists at Mississippi State University say Katrina destroyed or damaged up to three years’ worth of harvest timber in the state. Bob Daniels, forestry specialist for the university’s Extension Service, said the storm damaged $1.3 billion worth of timber on 1.2 million acres.

Laurie Grace, a forestry professor at Mississippi State, said tree farmers and industries &uot;have about a six- to nine-month window of opportunity to salvage most of the timber.&uot;

Correll said Georgia-Pacific will open 10-15 lumber yards to stack wood and keep it wet, which should keep it in usable condition for two to three years.

The state is providing job-training money and repairing roads, water systems and other infrastructure as incentives for Georgia-Pacific to reopen, said Gray Swoope, chief operating officer of the Mississippi Development Authority. Swoope said a dollar figure for the incentive package was not immediately available.

Correll said hiring for the Gloster and Roxie plants will begin immediately and the plants could be in full operation by the end of the year. Although the plants are coming back in service because of conditions caused by the hurricane, Correll said the reopening is not temporary.

&uot;We wouldn’t start them up and bring them back and then in a couple of years say, ‘Oh my goodness, we’re closing,’&uot; he said.

In other economic news in the wake of Katrina, Adams County supervisors are seeking some additional economic development incentives for the county.

Supervisors President Darryl Grennell said the board asked county attorney Bob Latham to draft a resolution asking legislators to expand the Rural Renewal Community designation for the county.

Currently, just the northwest part of the county falls under the designation, which arose after Nissan came to the state.

The designation is designed to bring more tax breaks and other incentives to businesses that locate in Rural Renewal Communities.

But Grennell said the entire county deserves such a designation because so many evacuees are in the area and will likely be looking for jobs.

&uot;We need to be able to help people find jobs,&uot; Grennell said.

Also Friday, the board of supervisors renewed a state of emergency for the county, which has existed since before Hurricane Katrina made landfall.