As many of you know, the post-earthquake reconstruction of Haiti has been extremely slow. As part of the relief effort, 6 NYPD police officers have volunteered for a 3-month tour of duty in Port-au-Prince. Our friend, Detective Ralph Jean-Pierre, left at the beginning of December to serve as a technical advisor to the Haitian National Police, a program sponsored by the State Department’s International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Bureau.
During his time in Haiti, he has connected with two schools in Port-au-Prince that were severely damaged by the earthquake. Despite losing five children in the earthquake, one school, Sa-Ira, continues to serve as an orphanage to approximately 160 students, ages 5-17. The second school, L’ecole Centre St. Francois D’Assis, has approximately 480 students in grades K-12. Both schools are in desperate need of school supplies.
The schools are in need of gently used or new: marble notebooks, loose-leaf paper, pens (blue ink), construction paper, Elmer’s glue, pencils, crayons, erasers, glitter, rulers, pencil sharpeners, children’s scissors, and inexpensive calculators. They are also looking for Ziploc sandwich bags to store supplies.
Detective Ralph has arranged for UPS to ship any donations to Haiti for free. He is going to receive the shipment at the airport and personally deliver the supplies to the schools to insure their safe arrival.
We are reaching out to our Kitchen Designs “family” of friends both near and far. Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated. Your donations can be dropped off at (or shipped to) our showroom by January 30, 2011. All supplies will be picked up on January 31. Please share this with your networks to help spread the word. Think about how much we could help the children in these two schools if everyone takes time to donate even one item.
Online friends: If shipping items… send — Attn: “For Haiti Schoolkids” Kitchen Designs by Ken Kelly, 26 Hillside Avenue, Williston Park, NY 11596
