UUSC Haiti Report
In the two months since the devastating earthquake in Haiti, UUSC has identified two growing emergencies: badly snarled relief efforts in Port-au-Prince and more than half a million displaced people with no access to aid.
Despite the massive influx of international aid, the United Nations’ provision of food, water, and shelter is still sporadic and inadequate, leaving only 40 percent of people with shelter, as the fast-approaching rainy season looms. UUSC is working to ensure aid is distributed with dignity in several of the more than 500 camps for internally displaced persons. In response to requests for trauma-healing work, UUSC has sent a team from the Trauma Resource Institute to Haiti to assess the viability of a trauma-response method.
Following the earthquake, more than half a million Haitians fled Port-au-Prince seeking food, shelter, and medical care in the countryside, putting severe strain on families who were already just scraping by. People are now scrambling to find food for one or two dozen additional people in their homes. In many areas, farmers are using their reserved seed corn and beans for food and will not have seed to plant.
UUSC is providing emergency funds to the Papaye Peasant Movement and the Lambi Fund to buy food for host families taking in displaced people as well as to patients at a hospital in Hinche. UUSC is also collaborating with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Development, Design and Dissemination studio (D-Lab), to work on techniques for creating biomass charcoal and harvesting water.
UUSC is working closely with human rights, faith-based, and development organizations to influence policymakers to promote a just recovery for Haiti and ensure the most vulnerable populations are not left out of the process. UUSC will continue to monitor policy developments and recommend action steps as needed. Haitians in the United States can apply for Temporary Protected Status (TPS), which allows them to continue to live and work in the United States for the next 18 months without fear of deportation. UUSC is providing free training for volunteers to help Haitians apply for TPS and complete fee-waiver applications in six clinics in the Boston/Cambridge area as well as clinics in New York, Miami, and Atlanta.
