The Slidell 9/11 Memorial Committee applied for a $4,000 grant last week to raise money to build a memorial site in Heritage Park, but to get the grant the committee is asking residents to lend a hand and their comments.

Councilwoman Kim Harbison, 9/11 Memorial Committee chairperson, said the Web site My Hometown Helper.com, which is sponsored by Hamburger Helper, has a contest in which towns across the country can win grants to build a monument to honor those who lost their lives in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City and the Pentagon in Washington D.C.

In 2002, the Krewe of Bilge donated a piece of a girder from the World Trade Center that was destroyed in the attack. The City Council voted to create the 9/11 Memorial Committee to build a monument around the WTC steel. The city also received a gift of part of the limestone wall of the part of the Pentagon that was destroyed.

An artist's drawing of the proposed 9-11 Memorial to be built in Heritage Park.

The committee started selling memory bells and 9/11 flags last August to raise money for the memorial, which is estimated to cost about $100,000. However, the committee has come up short on funds, and that is why they applied for the grant.

To get the grant, the city needs people's comments on the Web site, which the judges will read before making their final decision.

"We desperately need people to comment," Harbison said. "The more people online, the better the chance of us getting the grant."

Harbison said $4,000 is very short of the committee's goal, and they have changed their goals for the monument.

Harbison said at first they wanted to build the entire monument in one fell blow. But now, the committee is taking it in phases. Harbison said the grant will help them to build the first phase, which is to put the steel girder on a pedestal.

"That will be the centerpiece, and we will build more around it in phases," Harbison said. "We just want to show that the project is still alive, and we are still doing this."

When the entire monument is finished, it will have the girder, the Pentagon wall and a sculpture of the tail of a jet plane in memorial of the passengers of Flight 933 who prevented skyjackers from carrying out another terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001.

The monument, located near the Robert Landing at Heritage Park will be surrounded by benches and landscaping.

Besides submitting comments at the Hometown Helper Web site at www.hometownhelper.com, residents can also help by buying memory bells and 9/11 flags at the City Council Office in the City Hall trailer complex on Bayou Lane. For more information, call Melissa Mendoza at 646-4307.