- TNVOAD disaster update conference call – May 18, 2011
Fred Dettwiller (TNVOAD President) – It is his understanding that we are now in the recovery stage after the severe weather events in TN.
Sandra Brash (Lutheran Disaster Response) – She attended the Jefferson County long term recovery meeting and is looking in E TN at volunteer hospitality sites. Apison, TN (Hamilton Co) has a lot of reconstruction and rebuilding that will have to be done, homes that are no longer there, that’s what she’s seen from driving through. Gary Ward commented that he stopped in Greene Coounty last Saturday to observe the great amount of damage that was done there, probably about 400 homes were damaged or destroyed. He asked if there was any need for volunteers through the churches to go to Apison for rebuilding plans or wait for the Federal money to come through. Sandra said the first thing to wait for is for FEMA to be out there for people to apply and she feels sure there will be a need for volunteers for rebuilding/reconstruction and housing for volunteers.
Sue Duby (Hope Force Intl) – They still have three volunteers working in Chattanooga with the Salvation Army, but that effort will be wrapping up at the end of the week. They also have one volunteer working with the Salvation Army in Memphis, but her reports are that everything is on hold there, waiting for flood waters to recede. She added that their project director, who worked post Katrina in Biloxi and worked with the Nashville flood recovery has developed a two page document that outlines how to properly muck out a house to save the homeowners money by not ripping everything out. She will email it to Lou Mulsand to post on the TNVOAD website.
Brandon Hulette (UMC) – They currently have things going on in 30 middle TN counties, working closely the most recent disasters in Stewart and Houston Counties, unfortunately there are still barriers on assessments from there because of the flooding. There are several thousand volunteers registered to come in during June and July to do clean up and various jobs as needed. They will start supporting some of the west TN operations from their office. They are in contact with anyone that has an existing long term recovery committee, but they are scarce in west TN. There is a good one in Haywood County, but most long term committees are from the 2010 flood, not the 2011 disasters. 60-70% of West TN is still waiting for the flood waters to recede. It will probably be close to three weeks before they’ll be really ready for volunteers.
John Freitag (Lutheran Church) – Will be meeting with folks in Greene County next week and will have something to report on next weeks call. They have continued to provide spiritual and emotional in the Greene County area and that will be ongoing. There is a beginning awareness of the need for a long term recovery committee in that area.
Jason Anderson (Convoy of Hope) – They are still just monitoring the needs in Tennessee.
Gary Ward also reminded everyone to please continue to submit the volunteer hours weekly. Email the hours to him at gary.t.ward@comcast.net . Report volunteer hours since April 27th to offset the money that our state would have to pay toward the recovery efforts.
The next conference call is scheduled for next Wednesday, May 25th, 2:00pm(EST), 1:00pm(CST).