CWS updated appeal: 2010 Haiti earthquake -- Appeal #6762
Monday, April 26, 2010

Three months after the devastating earthquake in Haiti, CWS continues emergency activities focused on some of the country's most vulnerable citizens. At the same time, in response to evolving needs in Haiti, CWS is expanding its efforts to include the longer-term recovery and development programs that are necessary to truly enable Haiti to build back better.

A girl carries water at a camp for families made homeless by the January 12 earthquake in Haiti. Photo: Paul Jeffrey/ACT Alliance

Expanded Appeal Amount - $4,204,540

Funding Received To Date - $2,880,750

Situation

Three months after the devastating earthquake in Haiti, CWS continues emergency activities focused on some of the country’s most vulnerable citizens. At the same time, in response to evolving needs in Haiti, CWS is expanding its efforts to include the longer-term recovery and development programs that are necessary to truly enable Haiti to build back better.

CWS response

CWS will continue to work with local partners on the following initiatives:

• Repairing/building additions to permanent housing
• Supporting agricultural sustainability
• Managing spontaneous camps of displaced people
• Addressing the needs of vulnerable children
• Supporting economic recovery
• Empowering people with disabilities
• Providing material resources and logistical support

The programs in the appeal have an implementation timeline of 18-24 months, depending on the program.

1. Provide housing solutions to strengthen family life – support for house repair and host families expansion

Initial government plans to relocate huge numbers of families in new cities outside of Port-au-Prince have been frustrated by land ownership issues and costs. In response, CWS will work with Haitian partners and ACT Alliance members to focus on helping families where they are.

CWS will support:

1. Permanent house repair. CWS will repair damaged houses that can be made habitable and safe with minor work. This avoids the stress of relocation of displacement.

2. Expansion of host housing. CWS will expand the homes of families hosting displaced family members, to create a permanent livable situation. Adding bedrooms and latrines to meet Sphere standards will promote family unity and prevent conflict.

Prioritized groups will include households with members who are single mothers, disabled, elderly, pregnant women or children under 5 years old. Families living in CWS-supported settlements will also be a priority.

The total budget to rebuild or expand 150 homes is approximately $750,000. Per house/latrine costs are based on the rising cost of building supplies and fuel for material delivery.

2. Strengthen and expand 13 farmer cooperatives serving more than 3,000 members, and internally displaced people in northwest and Artibonite regions.

Year after year and disaster after disaster, the 13 rural cooperatives supported by CWS and Haitian partner SKDE have been effective in providing long-term food security and self-reliance in the Northwest and Artibonite regions. Today, these cooperatives face the challenge of providing enough food for more than 200,000 people who fled Port-au-Prince.

The co-ops provide their members with: access to revolving funds for necessities like seeds, tools and fertilizers; rural women´s access to small credit to help them start or expand a micro business; appropriate training and technical assistance including adult literacy; and emotional support to members and their families.

CWS will support:

1. Effective and transparent management of the co-ops’ revolving funds and provision of fair credit opportunities to rural women entrepreneurs and farmers to maintain and expand agricultural production.

2. Strengthening and monitoring of “Passing On the Gift” schemes existing in most co-ops, where recipients of animals such as goats and chickens share their offspring with other community members.

3. Provision and dissemination of training and technical assistance in selected areas to cooperative members and leaders.

4. Organizational and programmatic strengthening of the 13 cooperatives and CWS partner SKDE.

The total 2-year budget for this program is $450,000.

3. Provide basic services and transitional support to two spontaneous encampments

With partners Servicio Social de Iglesias Dominicanas and Christian Aid, CWS is serving two spontaneous camps of displaced people. These camps, in Fonds Parisien and Ganthier, near the border with Dominican Republic, were without any assistance until these three agencies arrived. Together we provide food, water and shelter materials meeting Sphere standards. In the coming weeks and months, CWS will continue to address these needs, in addition to assisting with leadership formation, community organizing and temporary shelter solutions.

CWS will support: Provision of food, water and temporary shelter solutions meeting Sphere standards to families in two settlements.

The total budget for this program is approximately $150,000.

4. Rebuild and expand local capacity to provide direct services and protection to 750 vulnerable children and youth in Port-au-Prince

Longtime CWS partner FOPJ serves some of the most vulnerable Haitian children, including restavek children (domestic servants), former gang members and teenage mothers in the Lasaline and Carrefour Feuilles areas of Port-au-Prince. Its center was severely damaged in the earthquake, leaving the agency homeless, like so many of the children it serves. While FOPJ continues to serve children with emotional recovery and educational activities, it cannot provide the sort of safe place that is needed now more than ever.

CWS will support:

1. A new center for FOPJ, either through the purchase and upgrading of an existing building or the construction of a new one ($90,000).

2. Provision of educational, vocational training, life skills and emotional support services to children, teenage mothers and former gang members ($125,000).

3. A pilot “Family Reintegration Project” aimed at reuniting restavek children sent to work as domestic servants in Port-au-Prince with their families in rural areas ($65,000).

4. Programs, operations and advocacy on behalf of the 10-plus member ASR Restavek Network, of which CWS is a part ($55,000).

5. The continued exchange and mutual learning between CWS partners serving vulnerable children in Haiti and in the Dominican Republic, with a focus on staff development, sharing of best practices and the promotion of peace and reconciliation ($25,000).

The total budget for this program is $360,000.

5. Support quick livelihood recovery by providing tools and small equipment

Many people with a trade and profession lost their tools and small machinery because of the earthquake. As one woman told a CWS staff member, “I was a hairdresser but without my tools, I am nothing.” Through grants averaging about $500, tradesmen and women will be able to purchase the tools and equipment they need to go back to work and be self-sustaining.

1. Provision of small “Quick Livelihood Recovery” grants to 150 families in the neighborhood of Carrefour Feuilles and to 300 people with disabilities in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area.

The total budget for this program is $240,000.

6. Provide direct services to 1,200 people with disabilities and their families in metropolitan Port-au-Prince.

In the chaos of the earthquake, and the ensuing struggle for survival and resources, people with disabilities are some of the most at-risk members of the community. They face greater challenges in adapting to new living conditions, such as tent cities, and have difficulty accessing relief assistance.

In response, CWS and Service Chretien d´Haiti, with technical support from Ecumenical Disabilities Advocates Network and the Cuban Council of Churches, support 1,200 people with disabilities and their families. Beneficiaries are referred to available services, participate in emotional recovery activities and can receive counseling to address the trauma of the earthquake and the challenge of adapting to new realities. The program serves people in the six regions of Port-au-Prince and is done in close coordination with the Government of Haiti Secretary of State for the Inclusion of Disabled People, as well as other local and international organizations. Between 10 and 20 percent of beneficiaries became disabled due to the earthquake.

CWS will support:

1. Case management services to link 1,200 people with disabilities and their families with available services.

2. Monthly cash assistance for people with disabilities.

3. Emotional and psycho-social support activities for people with disabilities.

4. Counseling for people with disabilities, with special emphasis on those who became disabled due to the earthquake.

5. “Quick Livelihood Recovery” grants to allow families with disabled members to create economic self-sufficiency.

6. Advocacy and awareness-raising amongst Haitian civil society, churches and ACT Alliance, and support for the consideration of people with disabilities in Haiti´s reconstruction plans.

The total budget for this program that is part of the overall ACT Alliance response is $1,228,000.

7. Providing material support to people in disaster

CWS has delivered hygiene, school and baby kits to more than 20,000 earthquake survivors, the majority of them people living in tent camps. CWS will continue to provide material support, as needed, to ensure that families have the basic items they need to live with dignity.

The total budget for this program is $74,540.

8. Management and operation of a Santo Domingo - Port-au-Prince humanitarian corridor in support of ACT Alliance operations in Haiti

Through Dominican Republic-based SSID, CWS is ensuring that the humanitarian corridor from Dominican Republic to Haiti remains a lifeline. With no functioning port in Haiti, humanitarian aid from CWS, ACT Alliance members, and others is being sent through the Dominican Republic. Getting items across the border, clearing customs, and ensuring proper transportation in both countries is a major, and essential, undertaking. In addition, SSID provides transportation of ACT Alliance staff member between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, where ACT members go for purchasing and other essential services.

The total budget for this program, included in the ACT Alliance appeal, is approximately $824,000.

9. Other components

CWS Staff Deployment Costs for 12 months - $72,000

Para-Legal for Temporary Protected Status Program, facilitated by the CWS Immigration and refugee Program - $56,000

How to help

Contributions to this CWS appeal may be made through your denomination or at www.churchworldservice.org/haiti or by phoning 800-297-1516 or by mailing to Church World Service, P.O. Box 968, Elkhart, IN 46515 (please indicate Haiti Earthquake appeal #6762).

Church World Service is a member of the ACT Alliance, a global coalition of churches and agencies engaged in development, humanitarian assistance and advocacy.

For further information about disasters to which Church World Service is responding please visit www.churchworldservice.org or call the CWS Hotline, (800) 297-1516.