Saturday, April 15, 2006

Meanwhile...The Annual 28th Annual National Hurricane Conference concluded Friday

Lots of nuggets of news to choose from....

1 comment:

Patricia Adams said...

CREW NEWS

CREW has been helping people throughout our community (Hendry and Glades counties) and identifying others that need help for several months. Over the next three months, CREW has already scheduled three volunteer crews from Lakeland, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana who are volunteering their times, donating supplies and costs or transportation and personal costs to come to our community to help rebuild homes and mend lives. CREW has identified a lot of people with needs and it will take a long time to meet all their needs, obviously the more volunteers we have and the more donations we have, the quicker this process will be. Many other long term recovery groups that have helped communities like ours recover have found it takes years. CREW expects the same.

I wanted to take the time to acknowledge the many people who have helped get us to where we are today. I think it is important that the community knows how local individuals and business have helped us, as well as those from far away. Crystal Strickland, Patricia and David Adams, AGAPE home, and Babcock Furniture donated mattress for people whose mattresses were destroyed in the hurricane. Rawl’s Real Estate donated office furniture. The Career and Service center has donated office equipment and supplies. Blue tarps were donated from the Core of Engineers, New Harvest Church, and the First United Methodist Church. Lumber was donated by Ronald Rounds, who also volunteered time and skilled labor. Bentley Killmon donated use of truck. Carson Killmon, Miguel Herrera and Tracy Rounds donated time and labor. Veronica Gambel donated dry wall as did Davidson’s Dry Cleaners who also generously donated paneling and carpet. David and Tommy McClussky donated time and labor. Wanda Banks donated a hot water heater. David Adams volunteered time and skilled labor and use of materials. The City of Clewiston has provided us office space, and City Building and Zoning Department has provided invaluable advice and feedback for us as we prepare to help clients rebuild their homes. The First United Methodist Church also has donated a lot of time, food, and office space and office supplies and covered a lot of our start up costs, as well as hosting several volunteer groups. Pastor and Kathy Hicks, of this same church, also provided numerous hours of volunteer time and professional expertise, as well as furniture. The Community Presbyterian Church donated a Shed and volunteer time. The First Baptist Church donated time and labor.

In addition, we have lots of exciting things happening. We are hoping to assist at least 5 families living in condemned trailers apply for new donated ones, assist a volunteer group and family build a home from the ground up, repair interior damage for those whose insurance only covered their roofs, repair and replace roofs, referral and advocacy as well as case management services to families, education, and many other services. We have volunteer groups coming in from Lakeland, Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania. We also hope to increase our volunteer labor by recruiting local individuals and organizations to assist as well.