Help the Foundation for Peace - Help Haiti
212-564-3334
www.hospitalitytalentscouts.com
Dear Friends of Hospitality Talent Scouts,
Many of you are aware that for the past several years, I have been working with an organization called the Foundation for Peace, which is a 501(c)(3) not-for profit organization that works in impoverished areas of Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Kenya. For the past 4 years, I have personally traveled along with my 17-year-old son to spend 10 days each summer working hand in hand with Haitians and Dominicans. Our projects have included building water treatment facilities, schools, and organizing medical clinics where we bring medical doctors into communities in dire need of medical attention. Many of you have generously donated to our fundraising requests by providing complimentary room nights for our charity auctions or by donating supplies for hygiene kits that we distribute at our medical clinics, which we conduct in some of the poorest areas of these countries.
The child above is one of those helped in part by our FFP volunteers working in the hospital in Jimani. We need your assistance to help more of them! To help these children, click here.
The president of the Foundation for Peace is Dr. Ken Culver, who is a medical doctor and Senior Medical Director for Novartis Pharmaceuticals in East Hanover, New Jersey. Last year, Dr. Culver asked me and I agreed to take on the role of Co-Chair of the Board of Missions for The Foundation for Peace beginning January 1st of this year. When I agreed to accept this position, never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine something as devastating as what has occurred in Haiti. I will be personally traveling to Haiti and the Dominican Republic, along with Dr. Culver and our leadership team, in two weeks. We will be determining during this trip where our efforts for the coming year will be focused. We already have full-time staff members and volunteers there.
Currently, our efforts are focused in Jimani, which is actually in the Dominican Republic, while most international effort is focused in and around Port-au-Prince. Our staff members there now are assisting injured Haitian refugees who have been transported or have walked to the border of the Dominican Republic. The need is great, and this location offers safety for our aid workers until the chaos is stabilized on the other side of the border. This is a logical crossing point, since it is a direct route to the Dominican Republic from Port-au-Prince, Haiti (see map below).
To help the needs of these displaced, injured people click here.
The people of Haiti are in desperate, urgent need as they try to cross the border into the Dominican Republic!
Our staff members have already been working in the overwhelmed hospital, manning a makeshift pharmacy, and helping in any way they can. We are also organizing to send water from our water purification system in Anse-a-pitre, Haiti, to Jacmel, a hard-hit area south of Port-au-Prince.
If you would like to be part of our efforts, knowing that I personally endorse this organization, you may help in one of three ways:
Make a donation to the Foundation for Peace by clicking here!
Donate needed supplies for our shipping containers. (See needed items listed below.)
Join one of our scheduled mission trips by clicking here.
The items currently needed for our shipping containers are as follows and must reach our containers in New Jersey by Friday February 5. Contact Frank Speranza for more details if you have donations.
Electrical generators
Bedding: sheets, pillows, towels, twin bed mattresses, and blankets
Food, including dry goods such as bags of beans, bags of rice (not minute rice), powdered milk, and high protein flour and pasta, vegetable oil, canned tomato paste, canned sardines, canned tuna, and baby food, all with an expiration date of more than a year
Healthcare supplies (cannot expire before September 2010): bandages, gauze, tape, antibiotic cream/ointment, acteaminophen, ibuprofen, sanitary napkins, diapers, alcohol swabs, betadine, toothbrushes, toothpaste, bars of soap, shampoo, crutches, walkers and wheel chairs
Building materials: wood (1/2 inch plywood, 1x12, 2x4, 2x6, 2x8 and 2x10), electrical (wiring: 12 gauge, light switches, light fixtures, switch boxes, switch box covers, and PCV pipe), louvered metal windows, doors (wood and metal), door handles, and hinges
Medical clinic items: casting materials, furniture, crutches, slings, examination tables, IV poles, IV fluids (expiration after 2010)
Personal items: toothbrushes, toothpaste, soap, shampoo, hand lotion, etc.
Note to hospitality professionals – What we in the industry might consider a discard because a sheet or towel has a small hole, we in fact can use for our Haitian friends. They are in desperate need of bedding, towels, etc.
Hospitality Talent Scouts is honored to partner with the Foundation for Peace for this very worthy cause, and if you cannot help in person or by donation of supplies, we would certainly appreciate it if you would consider a financial gift to support our work for the Haitian people.
Thank you for your consideration.
Frank Speranza
President Hospitality Talent Scouts
Co-Chair of the Board of Missions / Foundation for Peace