PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti-The World Council of Credit Unions' program to help extend financial services to the rural poor of Haiti took a big hit last month as its headquarters was completely destroyed in the massive earthquake here.
"Our building is a complete loss, it's still standing, but we're very lucky because I had half of the team out at meeting downtown," Haiti Program Director Greta Greathouse said in an audio update on WOCCU's website. "And the people who I made put on suits to pretend they were bankers were lucky, because it was on their desks that the walls and the ceilings fell in."
A majority of CU members in the area live outside the capital, so they are not as directly affected as others, but the disaster has hit hard Haiti's already poor economy.
Upbeat About Response, But...
Greathouse was upbeat about the response by the international community and noted that there is a constant stream of vehicles, supplies and workers coming across the border from the Dominican Republic. Aid that is coming by sea must go through Haiti's neighbor as its main port was destroyed in the earthquake.
But even as those supplies make their way to the capital, Greathouse acknowledged that the situation is actually worse than what it seems through television images. As the number of victims continues to rise, the medical, nutritional and sanitary conditions will likely worsen before they improve, she said.
The rebuilding process will soon begin, and WOCCU plans to be on the ground floor of what will assuredly be a massive effort. Greathouse is hopeful that the spotlight Haiti is receiving now will give the nation an opportunity to emerge stronger financially than it was before the disaster.
WOCCU EVP/COO Brian Branch told Credit Union Journal that the local program has been able to salvage some equipment from its destroyed headquarters and a recent supply trip provided staffers with medical supplies, food, water and cash to secure new office space as well as new residences, as many lost their homes in the disaster. The quake has also compelled WOCCU and USAID to change the program's contract to focus on not only its original mission, but also repairing and rebuilding physical locations as well as re-establishing network infrastructure at more than two-dozen CUs and local micro-finance institutions.
"Some of that will be rebuilding physical headquarters and branches and some of that will be putting new equipment in," Branch said. "If we have lost personnel in any of these institutions, we may have to hire and train new personnel and get them up and running."
WOCCU also plans on creating programs to encourage startup loans for enterprises, and because the Haiti market has little insurance, providing capital infusions to help local institutions absorb some of the losses they have incurred.
Credit Union Step Up Donations
The whole cooperative community has been quick to lend a helping hand to the devastated region, with dozens of CUs sending money directly and many matching member donations and others even donating percentages of daily transactions to the cause.
The National CU Foundation Disaster Relief Fund (also known as CUAid),has provided a central rallying point for the cooperative movement's donation efforts and has attracted some substantial sums, including $15,000 donations from CO-OP Financial Services, PSCU Financial Services and CUES, $20,000 donations from both CUNA and CUNA Mutual and $25,000 from SchoolsFirst FCU. WOCCU's direct appeals have netted more than $185,000 in donations as of last month-nearly $700,000 had been raised between WOCCU and CUAid.
