Clean Water-Sanitation Initiative for Rural Haiti

Greetings GlobalGiving Family! Everyone at C2C hopes you are all in good health and high spirits, while soaking up some sun and fun before Summer draws to an end. In our last report, I shared with you news of C2C’s upcoming Partner Community Visit (PCV) in July, where we would get to see the first group of 15, of the next 70 latrines, break ground, due to your contributions raised at the beginning of this year. 

I was fortunate to be one of six C2C Team Members to travel to Haïti and see in real time, not only where your contributions, but mine as well, are going to ensure our Partner Community achieves proper and sustainable health and sanitation. I witnessed one of the 15 latrines in its first phase of construction and got to meet the family chosen by ODCP, the leaders of the Peasant Association who represent the community and who you met in our last report, to receive one of the latrines. As I listened to a father and mother share in their own words the importance and need for their family of five to have their own latrine, I began to see and understand the impact our collective investments are making, to not only ensure their personal family’s health, but also the continued support and promotion of the entire community’s health. Through continued conversations with ODCP, we learned the community had not only been dealing with Cholera, but cases of Typhoid as well, due to lack of latrines and proper disposal of waste. Families were forced to remove their waste by digging holes and burying it near their living quarters or bagging and dumping waste in the canal water near their homes that they use for drinking, bathing, cleaning, and more.

With Phase 1, the first 70 latrines, complete and Phase 2, another 70 latrines, underway, ODCP reported a significant decrease in Typhoid within the community and zero instances of Cholera. The first 70 families are sharing their latrines with other families in the community, who are waiting for the ability and funds to construct their own latrine to ensure proper disposal of waste continues to keep their community clean and healthy. I know I’m a part of something greater than myself by investing in our Partner Community and their health. I hope you know you are too. Onward and upward!

Until next time...

Greetings GlobalGiving Community!  Everyone at Community2Community (C2C) and our Partner Communities in Petit Goâve, Haïti hope this check-in finds you well and gearing up for an incredible summer.  When last, we left you, we happily reported our Petit Goâve Proper Partner Community successfully completed the remaining 10 latrines, out of 70, within their community.  Again, C2C and our Partner Community would like to thank, you, for being an integral part in helping us to complete this goal back in 2017 with your investment and now with your continued giving in 2018 as we get ready to begin Phase 2 of our Latrine Initiative, which is 70 more latrines for another 70 families.  We would like to give a special shout out to three of our anonymous donors, who are choosing to financially contribute to the Latrine Initiative on a monthly basis, bringing our Partner Community another step closer to creating their own self-sufficiency through proper health and sanitation for all in their community.  When asked what life is like now in their community after the completion of the 70 latrines, here is what two of the members of the Peasant Association that C2C partners with had to say…

“I think it's important to say that it was difficult even before the earthquake.  Before the 70 latrines were constructed, our community was living in deplorable conditions.  Sometimes there were 3 or 4 families to one latrine. This contributed to unsanitary and unhealthy living conditions.  But after the earthquake, it was the C2C project manager who'd come to see us to see the conditions, as we described them, were true.  He then reached out to C2C New York with a request to help us. C2C said they would do their best to raise the funds and true to their word, they helped us and we constructed 15, then 15 more, then 15 more until we had 70 latrines. This has definitely changed the lives of our community for the better, but we continue to request help with 70 more because there are more families that need latrines.  So we, as members of the Peasant Association, continue to work with Community2Community to find ways to construct more latrines. We are grateful to C2C and their partners and friends who have contributed to this initiative to help us help our community members. We send our thanks.”

On our next Partner Community Visit, from July 20th-July 27th we will begin Phase 2 of the Latrine Initiative.  We are actively raising the necessary funds to send down to the community by July 15th so they can begin building the first group of 15 of the next 70 latrines.  Since meeting our $5,000 goal with our first GlobalGiving Campaign in November 2017, we increased our goal to $17,000 for our #70More Campaign.  We have raised $8,424, and have $8,576 to go. The work will continue until completion. We thank you, our GlobalGiving Community, for choosing to be game changers and active participants in helping to provide proper health and sanitation and restoring dignity back into our Partner Community. The sustainable impact of these latrines cannot be overstated.  

Until next time…