I greet you all from my crowded office here in Port-au-Prince after just returning from saying Mass at the Missionary Sisters of Charity's Chapel. I would not survive down here without the grace and power that comes in the early morning hours and the Eucharist. For me, each day begins at 4:30, silent prayer and spiritual reading from a few of my favorite books – usually a bit from St. Francis De Sales. This is where the power comes from – I surrender to God and because of His infinite Love I know that I don't have to face the onslaught of Haiti alone. It seems I can handle about 8-10 hours (with God's help) and that is about it. The 24 hour plan is boundless in wisdom and really works for me.

Usually by 10 am, I am frayed, and exhausted. The line outside our barrier never seems to lessen or go away. So many people are desperate and seem to have nowhere else to turn. I'm concerned that I'm overspending our emergency urgent assistance grants, but the truth is I help only a small fraction of the people and my heart often breaks when I just have to walk away from so many.

I go into Cite Soleil several times a day and make the rounds at our 8 campus locations. To do it right, you need 3 good hours. It is a little easier to get around now, because the intense and violent conflict between the UN and the neighborhood gangs no longer exists. More people are coming back to Cite Soleil and I can feel the weight of it. So many days the place is just a mad house! Recently, a gang leader (Franklin) in the Forte Dimanche – area where we run our St. Margaret Campus, took over the school and closed it, demanding money. I confronted him and closed the school for a few days until the pressure from the community forced him to back off. Reminders of the terrible fighting and violence are all around. The houses we built for the elderly are riddled with bullet holes as are many of our classrooms and school buildings. The conflicts are different now – without neighborhood leadership there is unchecked vengeance, theft, and violence among the lower level gang members and people living in Cite Soleil. Our kitchen workers have been attacked by these same members – who want food. We need to create jobs and training and install some workable system of government. So much of the day is spent ironing out petty rivalries and jealousies among staff and others. In the past few weeks alone, several staff people were threatened, one of our Oblate volunteers had a machete held to his throat right after Mass. This is just some of the ugly reality we must face.

But there are many bright spots. For the last 3 years, Hands Together was really one of the only major "educational institutions" fully functional in Cite Soleil. During the worst violence, nearly everyone left – but we pledged to remain as long as people needed help there, and we even expanded during these times. We built campuses and houses and continued feeding 4500-5000 kids a day. We gave out many tons of rice and beans and oil. Each month over 200 people received salaries – money our staff used to support as many as 15-20 family members.

As the summer nears and school is about to close we've created a large list of things we need to do before September. Our goal is to increase student spaces at our facilities and handle 8,000 students next year. Here are just a few of the things we must do:

1. Extend the school for the month of July for any parent and student who wants more education and nutrition;
2. renovate a complex and outfit it for major vocational training in computers, welding, auto repair, radio and communications, plumbing, electronics;
3. organize our summer elderly feeding program for 500 people;
4. paint, expand, repair, and renovate all 8 campus locations, add trees and gardens where possible;

Let me end by promising to pray for all of you and to think of you, especially when things seem hardest and darkest. I cherish your support and wish you all a good summer.

Working in Cite Soleil

In November, 2006, Scottish journalist Billy Briggs and photographer Angela Catlin, spent a week visiting Hands Together's projects in Cite Soleil on assignment to highlight the work of Scottish International Relief's Mary's Meals program that provides Hands Together with funding for 4,000 daily school meals.

There's no real way to understand Cite Soleil without first hand experience. The human suffering is inconceivable and the needs of the people are overwhelming. It's impossible to exaggerate the horrific conditions there, and no words can really capture the people's desperation and suffering. But one of the best descriptions we can offer comes from Billy Briggs, a Scottish journalist, combined with the images of his photographer friend, Angela Catlin. They visited our projects in Cite Soleil in November of 2006. Here is some of what he published in a newspaper in Scotland:

"Cite Soleil, home to nearly 500,000 people packed into land next to the port and to the sea, an area not even three square miles in total; the equivalent perhaps to the population of Edinburgh crammed into a scheme the size of Drumchapel in Glasgow. In the tropical heat half a million Haitians swelter in tiny ramshackle huts made of rusting corrugated iron sheets with no electricity, no running water and no sanitation.

Cite Soleil Now – May 2007

During late January and early February, 2007, UN forces conducted many operations in the slums and succeeded in dismantling the leadership of the armed gangs in Cite Soleil. With move toward security, we've seen a great increase in the population and greater traffic and larger markets. No longer do we hear gunfire each night, but there is a current of uncertainty and people seem anxious about what the future holds. We wonder where the leadership will come from and who and what will replace the current vacuum created after the gangs disbanded.

In some ways, the situation is just as volatile and will remain that way until real leadership, along with police and stable government can be established. Many young men who served under the gang leaders still live in the neighborhoods -- without jobs, without food and without much hope. These conditions only bring trouble. On April 24th the gang leader from Forte Dimanche took over our school preventing the children from entering. He demanded money before he would allow the children to come back. We closed the school and removed all desks and chairs to send a clear message that we will not allow schools to be used as tools for extortion. Pressure from the parents and community eventually help resolve the incident. In late May, right after Sunday Mass at the St. Anne Chapel, one of our Oblate volunteers (men aspiring to the priest hood who live at our center and teach at our high school) was threatened by a gang member who put a machete to his throat. Several times in the last 2 months, young men in the Brae Neuf zone entered our kitchen and took food and threatened our kitchen staff.

There is a tremendous need for employment right now and Hands Together has implemented some small work projects to help this situation. We organized 20 ex gang members from the Brea Neuf area and gave them work repairing houses, helping with the afternoon canteen and providing basic literacy for our fundamental classes. But Cite Soleil needs a massive job creation program. Our goal is to improve our schools and increase the number of children we feed by expanding the afternoon canteen programs.

Becky DeWine School - Holy Family Campus – Thank you Holy Family Parish – S. Pasadena, CA!

In December, 2006, we began construction of the 8th Becky DeWine school location– the Holy Family Campus. Located in the Bellicous slum neighborhood, along with our St. Jane Chantal campus, the Holy Family campus will open in September and serve over 500 children who are not in school. The neighboring St. Jane Chantal campus is already filled past capacity in its morning and afternoon sessions and still we noticed hundreds of naked children roaming the neighborhood, not going to school. We funded the relocation of a pig farm that bordered the sea and began construction of the Holy Family Campus building in December. Initial funding for the project came from Holy Family Parish in South Pasadena, CA -- whose extraordinary support in 2006 funded several major dry food distributions, a summer feeding canteen, two full months of teacher's salaries, the construction of 4 homes and major expansion of 2 Becky DeWine school campuses, and the building of the Holy Family campus shown below. In addition to the financial support, each year, Holy Family ships several sea containers filled with valuable educational and medical supplies. Photos below show ongoing construction of the 12 room building – February 2007 and May 2007.

Nutrition and Feeding

Daily feeding efforts in Cite Soleil now reach as many as 8,000 students, 800 elderly, and 175 teachers and support staff. Each day we use approximately 20 (110lb) bags of rice, 2 (100lb) bags of beans, gallons of sauce, and a large amount of propane – costing us approximately $5,700 per week. Two main kitchens prepare all the food needed for students and staff and HT staff distributes it to each of our 7 campus buildings for mid morning (for Hands Together School children) and afternoon (for neighborhood children at schools unable to provide lunch) meals.

Hands Together and BND (Bureau of Nutrition and Development)

During the last 8 months we strengthened our relationship with BND by making good use of their generous funds for 4,300 meals per day and their valuable training for our kitchen and nutrition staff. This nutritious daily meal is often the only food our school children will eat and without it they can become very sick and can struggle in school. We acknowledge gratefully BND's valuable gifts of kitchen and dining materials such as cups, plates and serving dishes.

The collaboration between BND and Hands Together extends to efforts in development and job creation within Cite Soleil. Together, we've worked on some project proposals for funding specific projects in Cite Soleil. The proposed projects include vocational programs in computer literacy, welding, and radio broadcast and communications and ongoing neighborhood clean up and sanitation work.

Scottish International Relief – Mary's Meals

The generous feeding grant from Mary's Meals not only helped us feed all the 3,500 afternoon associate school students, but also provided the funds needed to purchase the 560 (100lb) sacks of rice , 200 (100lb) sacks of beans, and 200 cases of cooking oil that we distributed to the poorest families living near our school campuses. Mary's meals renewed their Cite Soleil support for 2007 and we hope they consider expanding funding to HT schools in the rural areas of Gonaives.

Feeding outside Port-au-Prince

Hands Together also provides the primary daily meal for 2,020 children in six schools located in some of the poorest rural areas in the Gonaives Diocese.

In Ti Desdunnes, a desert farming village constantly suffering from drought, Hands Together runs a nutrition clinic that serves 600 meals a day to children ages 2-7, all of whom suffer from acute malnutrition. Recent fund raising efforts by Holy Family Parish in South Pasedena, CA will help us fund the construction of a much needed school here and provide k-8 education to hundreds of children.

Becky DeWine School Vocational Training

Cite Soleil is filled with young men and women desperate for jobs. Many of these know only the life of a gang member or (solda –soldier) and without that power, these young men feel desperate, hated, and vulnuerable. We believe that if given a chance, many of these people will cherish an opporunity to go to school and to work, so we've created several vocational programs and sholarship opportunities.

HT recently received a large, mulit-room facility located adjacent to our St. Ann high school campus. After some improvements and repairs, this large facility will provide the training space for things like welding, computer, plumbing, and other needed skills. Much of the teaching will come from our scholarship students, who, for the last two years, attended St. Gerard's vocational school in P-au-P and now must repay their HT scholarship by teaching here at the HT vocational center.

Inside shot of the HT vocational center - there are over 15 classrooms, full kitchen and a large meeting area. With little effort and cost, we will outfit this building with the equipment and supplies needed to get our vocational programs running.

We will work hard to create employment opportunities, such as: welding large garbage dumpsters to be located in the slums and hire students to clean up the area each week, organize school repair teams to make repairs and expansions to our school buildings, create water and sewer teams to improve the sanitation in neighborhoods, use students to build houses for the poor in Cite Soleil, create radio programs that will educate residents on prevantive issues and other valuable information. These are just a few of the ways we can tap into the energy of so many unemployed young people.

Hands Together Cite Soleil Vocation Programs for 2007

Please Help – Needed Items! - The above diagram illustrates the basic layout for our Soleil 19 Vocational center. Please help us reach as many young people as possible by donating any of the following items:

Auto repair hand tools, plumbing tools, small hand tools for computer repair, welding tools and equipment, radio communications equipment, and basic texts on electronics, welding, refrigeration, etc.. We send at least 1 large container to Haiti each year, so contact our office if you can donate any of these items.

Radio Boukman

In November, 2006, Hands Together started helping a small, grassroots community radio station – called Radio Boukman - located near our Soleil 24 school campuses. After several visits, we were so impressed with the resourcefulness, passion and commitment of the people who created the station that we provided them with seed money of $2,400 per month to help them improve and expand the radio station. Thanks to Holy Family Parish in Pasadena, CA, we donated a large 24 kw generator so that the station can offer 24 hour programming.

Today, Radio Boukman reaches hundreds of thousands of people through very active broadcasting which includes programs for music, sports, spiritual messages, health care programs, educational programs and many other community service programs. For residents living in Cite Soleil, radio is a powerful force that can offer hope and education to thousands. You can learn more about Radio Boukman by visiting their website at: www.radioboukman.com.

Water well drilling

During 2006, we drilled 21 water wells in poor rural areas of Haiti. Our goal for 2007 is to triple that amount. Thanks to several very generous gifts from our supporters, we can purchase a newer, more efficient well drilling machine that should allow us to access remote areas and more efficiently install drinking water and irrigation wells.

Emergency Housing

In the last two years we built 72 houses for the very poor in Cite Soleil. Not only do these homes give desperately poor people a place to live, but they give work to people in an area with 90% unemployment. In the near future we hope to create building teams, using graduates of our vocational programs, and put them to work improving and building homes in Cite Soleil.

Help from St. Veronica Parish – Cincinnati, OH

We gratefully acknowledge our good friends from St. Veronica in Cincinnati who've supported Hands Together since 1996. In the past 2 years, their generous collections helped us build 3 homes for the elderly, add classrooms to our St. Veronica Campus and pay teachers' salaries. During the last decade, St. Veronica sent more than $200,000 worth of educational and medical supplies and funded over 6 water wells.

On May 19, our friends, former US Senator, Mike DeWine and his wife Fran, spoke at St. Veronica church to thank them for the past support and update them on the activities of the Hands Together and the Becky DeWine School. Proceeds from the collections taken that weekend will support the operations of the St. Veronica campus in Cite Soleil.

Development Projects

Hands Together focuses its development work into four primary areas of intervention – Environment, Education, Health, and potable water projects. We channel approximately one third of our total resources to these programs located outside of Port-au-Prince.

Environment

Hands Together runs an environmental protection program designed to sensitize and educate young people and adults from all areas of Gonaives on the protection, care and respect of natural resources.

We plan on training more than 2,000 people over a three year period – and will plant 100,000 tree seedlings. Participants will organize mini-fairs and invite grass roots peasant groups to learn how to properly use their available natural resources.

Education

The state of elementary education in Haiti is abysmal. Only 15% of the schools receive funding from the government and the rest are run by the church or other private groups. Existing schools reach only a fraction of the children and facilities are very crude, teacher's lack proper formation and competency and most schools cannot afford to feed the students.

Our goal for the next year is to improve the quality of teaching in 10 rural schools and to increase the salaries of the Gonaives diocesan teachers. This past school year, Hands Together funding provided a $65 salary supplement to 783 teachers in Gonaives and purchased 150 benches, 100 tables and 64 cases of chalk for the schools in the Diocese of Gonaives.

In addition, Hands Together provides support to poor elementary schools in Brunette, Guimby, Declin, Bassen, Anse Rouge, and several other rural parts of the Gonaives Diocese.

Health

Haiti's health care system is one of the worst in the world, with only 49 public hospitals, 371 dispensaries and 217 health centers. 45% of the population has no access to any health services. There are only 803 doctors, 92 dentists, 657 nurses for a population of 8 million people.

Hand Together seeks works hard to improve basic health services to several very poor areas and implement preventive health education to help reduce disease and illness. For 2007-2008 we will implement several training programs for midwives and organize mothers for classes and training on pre and post natal care – especially in very poor, arid villages. We will establish health care committees in these villages and they will impart preventive health care teaching. With funding and educational materials from UNICEF we can implement Maternal health programs in Ti Desdunnes and other villages.

Clinic Construction

During the last 6 months we partnered with a Swiss Architectual School – Bernoise School for Civil Engineering – to build 3 medical health Centers in remote parts of the Gonaives Diocese. Sponsored by the Albert Schweitzer Hospital, the goal of this project is to increase the health care services to the poor in rural areas and link the sattelite clinics to the Albert Schweitzer Hospital – who would provide the training and staff. Hands Together's development team finished construction of all three clinics in February – 2007.

Our continued funding and medical supply donations several diocesan run medical dispenaries help us provide the basic "first line of defense" care that can save the life of children with dysentary, diarrhea, fevers and other heatlh problems.

Water Resources

Unclean and scarce water causes most of Haiti health problems. Only 1 out of every 10 Haitians has access to piped water in their homes. 42% of all infant deaths can be traced to diarrhea caused by unclean water.A new water poverty index was developed by a Third World Forum through a group of researchers at Britain's Center for Ecology and Hydrology and Experts from the World Water Council. Out of a total of 147 countries, Finland ranks top followed by Canada, Iceland, Norway, etc. At the bottom of the scale, Haiti lies last at 147th.

In 2007-2008 Hands Together will drill 50 water wells in areas desperate for clean water.