ALABAMA TORNADOES

Clyde Pressley
Executive Director

Before we could send out this newsletter, several communities in our Conference were hit by devastating tornadoes. Your Disaster Recovery Ministry office immediately began contacting the pastors and District Disaster Coordinators in the effected areas to learn the extent of the damage and offer assistance when needed. Calls have already begun coming in from those wanting to help. Disaster officials are requesting that volunteer groups not come to the area immediately. Please coordinate with the DRM to know when it is appropriate for your group to go. After coordinating through the DRM, all teams going to the area will then check in with a Volunteer Reception Center (VRC) to register and be assigned a work area.

The VRC is a new system the Alabama Volunteer Organizations Active in a Disaster (VOAD) had just begun training communities on, but will have its first field test with this disaster. If you are a group within the Conference wanting to help you may call the DRM office at 866-340-1956. Those from other Conferences are asked to please call the Southeast Jurisdiction UMVIM office at 404-377-7424.

********************

MINISTRY MINUTE

The Alabama-West Florida Conference disaster response office that came into being immediately following Hurricane Ivan in September 2004 is still very much in operation two and a half years later, but with a much expanded mission.

In February 2005 disaster response shifted into long term recovery and we named our effort the Disaster Recovery Ministry (DRM). Our mission then, as is now, was to help the people of northwest Florida and southwest Alabama recover from the damage they sustained from the hurricanes. We added recovery from Hurricane Dennis to our mission in July 2005 and expanded into a much larger organization following Hurricane Katrina that hit in August 2005.

What started out as a one room operation with a single volunteer coordinator and lots of volunteers has now grown into a ten person operation with a suite of offices in Mobile, another in Bayou La Batre, and a motor home office. In addition we have amassed an impressive inventory of tools, trailers, trucks and office equipment. The generosity of the people called Methodists has made all this possible.

The United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) has provided generous grants to our Conference following each disaster. People across the nation have sent money to UMCOR and have personally volunteered their time, talent, and energies to come to our area to help with the recovery. With their assistance and the dedicated professional skills of our DRM casework management and on-site construction supervision teams we have been able to assist in the recovery of a lot of people throughout the effected area.

Since the casework management office was opened in Bayou La Batre in March 2006 our casework managers have worked with 178 families. Funds from all sources allocated for the cases presented to the Long Term Recovery Committee�s (LTRC) Resource Coordination Sub-committee came to $663,752.09. Of that amount $97,489.95 was provided by DRM.

*******************

GET INVOLVED IN YOUR LOCAL VOAD
(Volunteer Organizations Active in a Disaster)

The VOAD is an organization that exists at the local, state and national levels that brings together faith based and non-profit groups that become active in a disaster. The VOAD provides an effective means for such organizations to cooperate, coordinate, collaborate, and communicate in order to provide a more effective, efficient and productive response following a disaster.

Rather than wasting time, effort, and resources as a result of redundant, overlapping, and/or unnecessary efforts, your church would be much more effective in helping people affected by a disaster by becoming involved in a local county VOAD. Check with you county Emergency Management Agency (EMA) to see if a VOAD exists in you area. If not become active in organizing one.

Your Alabama-West Florida Disaster Recovery Ministry is involved in VOAD at the local, state and national level and will assist you in any way we can to get a VOAD organized in your area.

*******************

INFORMATION REQUESTED

Governor Riley has asked the Alabama Department of Economic & Community Affairs (ADECA) to identify Long Term Recovery Programs in place within faith-based organizations for each county. The intent and final product of this project is to support existing disaster relief programs and aid in establishing additional resources to better coordinate efforts to care for and support Alabamians in need at both the county and state levels.

We have been asked by ADECA to assist in compiling this information from the churches in our Conference. As we began to gather information, we found our database lacking some of the information they have requested. We would like to assimilate this information for ADECA in a timely manner.

Please assist us in this task by contacting this office via our toll-free number (866-340-1956) or email (disaster@awfumc.org) by March 15 and provide the following information: church name, county, contact person, address, telephone number, emergency cell number, e-mail address, and specific resource(s) available within the church.

********************

VOLUNTEERS STILL NEEDED

Ron Baughman
Director of Volunteers

We currently have 15 homes in various stages of repair, from re-roofing and complete interior repair to finishing work of painting, flooring, and trim. We add a home a week to that list.

We are still seeking teams to come and assist homeowners in recovering from the hurricanes that hit the Mobile area in 2005 and 2006. We are booked for the month of March but have lots of openings from April throughout the summer.

We are seeking volunteer groups of 10-15 to do home repair (roofing, sheet-rock, minor carpentry, minor plumbing and minor electrical). We accept youth 16 and older, and ask for an adult to youth ratio of 1:3. We will house you in a church, with access to showers and a kitchen. Come and make a difference in someone�s life!

********************

CASEWORK IN LONG TERM RECOVERY

Sandra Kennedy-Owes
Director of Casework Services

The heart of our care-giving ministry is casework, with focus upon an individual�s or family�s recovery. Case management is the key that opens the door for disaster survivors. We seek to help the whole person recover from the disaster. Our primary concern is to restore or help preserve the dignity of the survivors as they plan for recovery. Christian casework in disaster recovery empowers people to move on.

The ministry has employed three case managers, Gerald Gamble, Laura Staples and Martha Woods; and supported case management activities in other areas. We have also utilized volunteers and student interns from The University of Mobile. The case managers work over the long-term with survivors to make an in-depth assessment of their needs in order to determine which are disaster-related, and then help the family develop a recovery plan sometimes utilizing both their resources and the resources of the helping organizations including UMCOR funds. The team has identified and verified the needs of families requiring assistance from The United Methodist and other organizations and has successfully presented those unmet needs to the Long-term Recovery Committee.

The majority of our casework is concentrated in the South Mobile County (Bayou La Batre) area. The ministry is well respected for the quality of casework and we have set the standard for this area.

Sandra Kennedy-Owes, our Director of Casework Services, is the chair of the LTRC�s Case Management Sub-committee. She provides the training and guidance to the LTRC in this area. Our case managers are second to none! They are tops in the field and display a great deal of professionalism in their approach to case management.

In collaboration with Lutheran Disaster Response, Volunteers Of America, Catholic Social Services, Volunteer Mobile and others (partners in the LTRC), our case managers successfully work with families to determine their unmet need and present their cases through the case management committee. This committee agrees to send the family�s request to the RCC (Resource Coordination Committee) for funding.

The case managers continue to work with the family to ensure follow-through on commitments of funding and other resources to help rebuild their lives. No case is closed until all needs are met that can be addressed by LTRC, and proper referrals have been made on behalf of the family.

********************

Spotlight on � Laura Staples

Each month we will introduce you to a member of the Disaster Recovery Ministry�s team in our �Spotlight on �� segment. This month, our spotlight is on Laura Staples, one of our casework managers in Bayou La Batre.

Laura received her BS degree in Human Services from the University of South Alabama. Her studies in this area encompassed the disciplines of psychology, sociology, communication and human development. After receiving her MS degree in community counseling, also from the University of South Alabama, Laura worked as a clinical therapist, treating clients with, among other issues, substance abuse issues, depression, anxiety, and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Working with clients with these issues certainly qualified her to transition to her disaster recovery work.

Just prior to joining our ministry, Laura worked as a crisis counselor supervisor in Alabama and Mississippi. She also served as one of 4 crisis counselors on the cruise ship, The Holiday, while it was used in Mobile as a hurricane shelter.

She has given a number of presentations on hurricane preparedness, stress management, and compassion fatigue for clients, colleagues, and community businesses.

Laura joined the Disaster Recovery Ministry team in September, and says she receives many blessings as a result of her work with her clients. She relates the following story as a highlight in her work in Bayou La Batre.

�A woman with whom I worked while employed at my first disaster recovery job right after the storm has also become a client of mine here at the Disaster Recovery Ministry.

She and her daughter were two of the first people I met in Bayou La Batre, in my first job in disaster recovery, and their situation just broke my heart. Their mobile home had been heavily damaged in Katrina, but they continued to live in it because they had no other place to go. One night it caught fire because of damage to the electrical wiring and burned beyond repair. I worked with them for 5 months and helped them with as much as I could.

I lost contact with them when I began working in Mississippi, as I discovered their phone had been disconnected when I called to see how they were. I knew it was always going to bother me that I did not get to see their case completed and would probably never know the success of their recovery.

I am happy to say that when I started working at DRM, whose name did I see on my client list but the mother�s! I was so happy! Because of the collaborative efforts of this lady, myself, and many others, I am thrilled to say that she is now living in a new mobile home right where her old one used to be. I have seen her daughter on several occasions, and she is well on the way to recovery, too. I truly believe that it was divine intervention which brought both of us to DRM, and I am so grateful to have been able to continue as a part of her recovery process. God is so good!�