OperationGetDone.org: Streamlining Disaster Relief

Field Updates

March 14th, 2010 - "Cash For Clean-Up Program"

"After unfortunately spending about ten days taking someone in Cap Haitien to court for theft, I began thinking about what our organization's next project would be. I had lot's of large-scale ideas such as cooperative farms and vocational schools, but the logistics of such projects in a country like Haiti were daunting and projects that aren't closely looked after often times succumb to corruption and inefficiency.

I finally chose an idea for it's simplicity. Cap Haitien was once a gorgeous city filled with Island charm. It's surrounded on three sides by lush green hills and on one side by the ocean. The street going along the ocean is called the Boulevard and was once lined with palm trees which had colored lights hanging from them. The buildings in the center of town were painted Caribbean pastel colors and the streets were made of stone and well-maintained. And there was a beautiful beach right off the boulevard. Not surprisingly, there was a booming tourist industry back then.

Today, the roads resemble double black diamond ski trails with piles of trash on every corner. The whole town has a dust problem and the paint is peeling off most of the buildings. The tourism industry has not surprisingly dropped to virtually zero and the three nice hotels in town are all kept alive only by aid workers and businessmen.

So I created a cash-for-work program to clean up the city. With an estimated unemployment rate of 75%, Cap Haitien certainly has people who are desperate for jobs. I decided to start with the beach that was once so beautiful and that before our work was literally completely covered with every sort of trash from blankets, to shoes, to water bottles, to large screen TV's.

The initial strategy was to start off slow and small and hire five people that I already knew and had worked with to help me fill the eighty 55-gallon garbage bags that I purchased. As we worked through the day, a crowd formed around our project and we decided to let everyone in the crowd work. We started paying people by the bag of trash collected instead of by the hour and the results were amazing. We filled up all eighty bags in only about an hour and a half. We also made a large pile of blankets and clothing to be burned and carried all of the large items such as TV's and logs into a pile by the side of the road where they can be easily collected.

After all of our bags were filled and deposited close to the road for pickup, we tallied what we owed everyone and they waited patiently. We called the workers by name and they came up and collected their money. Most of the workers were younger than sixteen and living on the streets. One of the highest scoring workers was a mute street kid around thirteen years old. Some of the workers were so illiterate that they couldn't sign an X to confirm that they had been paid. It felt good to see their faces light up when they received the money. It also felt good to give something away in return for their work rather than out of pity.

As I was chatting with the workers after they had received their money, a radio talk show host drove up and expressed his appreciation of the work that we were doing for the city and arranged a live interview on the air to discuss our project.

I consider the cash for clean-up program here in Cap Haitien a large success so far and we plan on finishing the beach clean-up on Monday (3/15/10) when the market is open so that we can purchase more trash bags. The local government and several larger NGO's were once again very cooperative promising workers, tools, and dump trucks."




	Field Updates March 14th, 2010 - "Cash For Clean-Up Program" "After unfortunately spending about ten days taking someone in Cap Haitien to court for theft, I began thinking about what our organization's next project would be. I had lot's of large-scale ideas such as cooperative farms and vocational schools, but the logistics of such projects in a country like Haiti were daunting and projects that aren't closely looked after often times succumb to corruption and inefficiency. I finally chose an idea for it's simplicity. Cap Haitien was once a gorgeous city filled with Island charm. It's surrounded on three sides by lush green hills and on one side by the ocean. The street going along the ocean is called the Boulevard and was once lined with palm trees which had colored lights hanging from them. The buildings in the center of town were painted Caribbean pastel colors and the streets were made of stone and well-maintained. And there was a beautiful beach right off the boulevard. Not surprisingly, there was a booming tourist industry back then. Today, the roads resemble double black diamond ski trails with piles of trash on every corner. The whole town has a dust problem and the paint is peeling off most of the buildings. The tourism industry has not surprisingly dropped to virtually zero and the three nice hotels in town are all kept alive only by aid workers and businessmen. So I created a cash-for-work program to clean up the city. With an estimated unemployment rate of 75%, Cap Haitien certainly has people who are desperate for jobs. I decided to start with the beach that was once so beautiful and that before our work was literally completely covered with every sort of trash from blankets, to shoes, to water bottles, to large screen TV's. The initial strategy was to start off slow and small and hire five people that I already knew and had worked with to help me fill the eighty 55-gallon garbage bags that I purchased. As we worked through the day, a crowd formed around our project and we decided to let everyone in the crowd work. We started paying people by the bag of trash collected instead of by the hour and the results were amazing. We filled up all eighty bags in only about an hour and a half. We also made a large pile of blankets and clothing to be burned and carried all of the large items such as TV's and logs into a pile by the side of the road where they can be easily collected. After all of our bags were filled and deposited close to the road for pickup, we tallied what we owed everyone and they waited patiently. We called the workers by name and they came up and collected their money. Most of the workers were younger than sixteen and living on the streets. One of the highest scoring workers was a mute street kid around thirteen years old. Some of the workers were so illiterate that they couldn't sign an X to confirm that they had been paid. It felt good to see their faces light up when they received the money. It also felt good to give something away in return for their work rather than out of pity. As I was chatting with the workers after they had received their money, a radio talk show host drove up and expressed his appreciation of the work that we were doing for the city and arranged a live interview on the air to discuss our project. I consider the cash for clean-up program here in Cap Haitien a large success so far and we plan on finishing the beach clean-up on Monday (3/15/10) when the market is open so that we can purchase more trash bags. The local government and several larger NGO's were once again very cooperative promising workers, tools, and dump trucks."
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