by Steve Hollingworth, CARE USA COO and EVP, Global Operations

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

11:00 a.m.

Patrick Solomon, CARE's SVP for Global Support Services, and I are traveling with a CARE convoy to distribute water bladders, jerrycans and hygiene kits to 135,000 people staying in an areas southwest of Port-au-Prince in a town called Léogâne. We have 21 staff moving out in four SUVs and a large truck. There is lots of apprehension in the car about keeping together through the extremely congested traffic. The trip should take around two hours.

Steve Hollingworth, Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President, Global Operations

An advance car will approach the community to meet the mayor and other officials to see if they have followed our directions on notifying the local people setting up a way to register people for assistance. The trucks with the supplies will wait on the outskirts of town in order for the advance group to confirm that all is in order.

11:41 a.m.

The smell of dust, urine, feces and decaying bodies is oppressive. We have passed eight or more corpses on the roadside and many more are still buried under the rubble.

The road is a mess in this area as we head to epicenter of some of the most affected communities. We're driving over and around cracks, fissures and landslides on the main road, causing us to roll along at a slow pace.

In this highly-destroyed area, we see a few camps and even the resumption of market activities.

Photo: 2010 Evelyn Hockstein/CARE

12:24 p.m.

Every house in this area destroyed. People are camping in open fields, in the colleges. Children are sleeping in broken down cars. We're approaching the mayor's office. They have taken our suggestions. Police are present. Area laid out for receiving people. Table set for registration. Notice has gone to out to people that the distribution will happen.

There are 20,000 displaced families living in camps in town and another 15 camps are set up outside of town.

Local authorities have taken good steps with renovating some boreholes and digging latrines. Good progress at organizing camps. But they will need sustained distribution.

The Canadian military is here, too, setting up a small field hospital.

The mayor's office has arranged a logistics committee, and we are going now to brief the mayor's team for the distribution and installation of the bladders.

The mayor tells us that there are real sanitation needs in all the camp in town and on the outskirts.

We are traveling back from today's distribution site. We're in the part of town where the main commercial warehouses are located. The warehouses are being emptied in a hurry with line of men tossing boxes onto trucks. People move between the rubble looking for goods to take and warehouses to enter. They are carrying boxes on their head. The police are here making a show of force and also protecting the line of men. There is a real sense of panic and people are scrambling to defend their warehouses.

There is a huge mess at airport. I went to the airport to check on CARE shipments and how they would be handled. We expect a plane of donated good from the Church of the Latter Day Saints that UPS is air shipping to us free of charge. The path is clear for the shipment to arrive.

Clearly, there is a a huge incoming volume of goods. I am so pleased that our distribution went so well today. Smooth distribution is the real key for the future – establishing a dependable pipeline and building the trust of the communities.

It's so important to have good quality distributions, and poorly-managed distributions cause big problems. People get upset when their expectations aren't fulfilled, and frustrated recipients may react violently. In addition, there is always the risk of disruption from criminals.

So going to a community beforehand and explaining what is coming, and that the local authorities play their role in organizing people is a huge help. And keeping our word is the way to make it successful.

Yesterday, our staff went to meet a local community outside of Port-au-Prince. CARE asked them about their needs and they confirmed that it is water. We also met with the mayor of the canton, and explained what we would do and how we would do it. We committed to return today with water bladders, hygiene kits and jerrycans. And we did. The community was very orderly and had organized a water management committee consisting of three women and three men. The distribution all went extremely well in a very congested location that could have been extremely tense. I think the community was satisfied as well.

7:10 p.m.

We also had an in town distribution. Sophie, the country director of CARE in Haiti, reported back that it was successful, too.

The planning for tomorrow is going well. The group has debriefed and learned from the day. Vehicles fueled, parked and ready to go.

Staff are very elated by the success of the day. Again, the consultation with local authorities, and the organization of the distribution space, meant that there was no frustration. The expectations of the community were fulfilled. They have trust and confidence in us. And they have been treated with dignity and respect. The recipients were not intimidated by a large security presence. They had a central role in the distribution and the local authorities were respected and in charge.

These are lessons we have learned from emergencies all over the world. This has also come from our years of working with local communities in all of our long term work.

• :: You can help! Donate now to support CARE's lifesaving emergency relief efforts in Haiti.
• :: Read more about CARE's emergency response in Haiti.