Warmer, Safer, Drier

Lee County Tornado Recovery- Update

May 6^th marked 60 days since the deadly tornados plowed through Lee County. Despite the destruction, the response has continued to be strong and although slow, progress is being made and lives are being restored. We love seeing Jesus proclaimed during these times. Below are some ways to serve with us and some progress notes:

• 2-3 heavy and medium equipment and operators are needed mainly in the Beauregard area. ARM has a mini skid steer for the next month that can be used by trained operators.
• Chainsaws are not in as much demand but small crews can still work
• Most of the debris removal is small and more akin to cleaning up trash. This includes insulation, clothing pieces and more.
• The construction phase should begin to become more routine and needed from June until families have recovered. This will be the bulk of our work with UMCOR and ARM.

ARM can host teams in two areas, Tuskegee and Opelika. Our summer schedule is set to host weeklong teams (Sunday-Friday at $195/person) and on weekends ($28/person/day).

Week long teams are hosted by ARM interns who take care of your site, arrange for your materials and take care of your meals. They coordinate daily devotions, nightly worship, and debrief sessions. Weekend teams are a little more self-sufficient in that they take care of their meals and the ARM staff are most likely not present in the evening. We still take care of your materials. If you would like more information about bringing a team, please contact Andrew Baird at Andrew@arm-al.org.

• Updates:

• • The ARM team participated in the three day disaster case manager training provided by UMCOR. Our case managers now have the ability to begin helping people with unmet needs ie. not helped by FEMA, un-insured, and under-insured through the recovery process.
  • ARM continues to facilitate a community group on overseeing the construction and rehab. process in addition to the housing process. We meet 2 Tuesday’s per month for one hour and talk thought our strategies an updates on homes needing minor construction. If you are local to AU/Opelika and would like to participate in this team, please let Lisa Pierce lisa@arm-al.org know.
  • We are teaching a short and abbreviated damage assessment session for AU building science students and anyone else interested on Wednesday May 22^nd beginning at 4:00pm at the AU Gorrie Center/McWhorter School of Building Science. This course will train on a systematic method of assessing damages and recording so that ARM and others can develop thorough scopes of work and construction estimates. Contact Joseph Farris at joseph@arm-al.org to register your attendance.
  • The Fuller Center for housing began 3 homes and is conducting a blitz build in September of nine more homes. If you would like to help out, register your interest at the MEND hotline, 334-528-MEND (6363).
  • With our team that includes Rev. Katrina Love (case manager), Ms. Allison Porter (case manager), Mr. Andrew Baird (Volunteer Coordinator) and Mr. Joseph Farris (Construction Supervisor), we have hosted over 25 groups with over 169 volunteers and logged 1727 volunteer hours. We have served multiple families throughout Lee County!
  • • We look forward to continuing to walk alongside families as they recover!

More thanks:

1. We appreciate the several gifts cards we received that went directly to families or helped us by tools.
2. We appreciate grants from local churches totaling over $50,000 for construction
3. We are grateful to the words of encouragement!

This is a marathon like our friends in the Marianna/Panama City District. Speaking of Marianna, we are hosting teams there as well if you would like to still support that effort. A few weeks ago, Marianna was still a blue-tarp town. They desperately need love in the way of teams!

To register for Lee County: www.arm-al.org/tornadoregistration

Marianna and Hurricane Michael: www.arm-al.org/summermissions

2 Corinthians 1:3-5

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.