CHF - Helping Rebuild Haiti

Dorzely Octave is a 42 year old mother of eight children, aged between 10 and 24 years old. She is the head of household and supports her family alone. Before the earthquake, Dorzely had a small business selling coffee and bread and kept her supplies in a storage place in Delmas. But when the quake struck, the building was destroyed. All of her stock and materials inside were unsalvageable.

Dorzely is now part of CHF’s rubble removal team working Delmas. On February 8, she was working on Delmas 17 with the rest of her team. The ‘HIMO’ rubble removal teams are an essential element of recovery from earthquakes and other natural disasters. Not only do they undertake essential clean up work, they restore people’s livelihoods by employing them in cash for work activities that enable them to support their families. These teams are also empowering, as they employ Haitian men and women in the recovery efforts, making them active participants rather than passive ‘beneficiairies’. With purpose and a sense of solidarity, it becomes their recovery process.

CHF’s HIMO teams consist of 12 people, and we aim to have a balance of men and women – our experience is that women are capable of doing the same work as men in rubble removal. Dorzely says:

“I am proud to be part of this team. We are helping to clean the streets. I am able to help with the clean-up efforts. My job is to take the stones and debris and put it into the wheelbarrows. It is great to be a woman on this team because I am working with all of these men and I can prove that I am just as strong as they are.”

Dorzely was in a small town just on the outskirts of Port au Prince when the quake hit. She immediately tried to get back into the city to get to her house:

“My kids were in the house when the earthquake hit. I was so afraid because I was not with them. But when I came back to the city, I found them all alive with only some small injures. My house did not fall, but it is pretty damaged. One of my daughters is sick. With my first pay check I will take her to the doctor and buy her the medicine that she needs. With the second pay check I will try to purchase some of the items I lost and re-start my business.”

On February 16th, CHF completed the first payroll for its ongoing cash-for-work earthquake recovery project. In less than two hours, CHF paid 429 workers for their two-week participation removing rubble from streets, public buildings, and private homes in Petit Goave. This was the fastest and most orderly payroll CHF has ever seen in Petit-Goave. During the first two weeks of clean up activities in Petit Goave, workers removed nearly 1600 cubic meters of rubble and CHF has paid more than US$30,000 directly to workers.

Thank you for your continuing support of CHF as we work to put the people of Haiti back on their feet.