July 2023 🇭🇹 Haiti News

By Guesly Dessieux
Executive Director and Founder

There are days when I think about Haiti and tears start flowing out of my eyes as I feel powerless to change the situation. The news continues to weigh heavy on our hearts, but we remain optimistic and continue to work under traumatic conditions while attempting to meet the needs of those most at risk: children and youth. Many organizations have had to close their doors with inflation of prices and significant insecurity. PLH is standing strong and has responded to the national crisis. PLH employs 31 Haitians that keep our programs running. We have 200 kids and young adults participating in our programs weekly. We provide food relief to 16 churches and are feeding 130 youth weekly.  We remain steadfast to continue the work and trust in God's plan for Haiti but we need your help more than ever.  

Tomorrow, we launch our Join the Community campaign. Our goal is to raise $7000 in new monthly giving and we need your help to reach that goal. Monthly support keeps our Haitian staff employed, keeps programs going on the campus, allows us to organize events to encourage the community, and makes it possible for PLH to continue to push forward. If you are a monthly donor, I want to say a huge thank you. You have sustained PLH through some of its hardest months. If you are not a monthly donor, I want to invite you to join!

For as little as $10 a month, you can help continue the work of PLH and empower Haitians to build a stronger Haiti.

$25 a month can help keep the soccer fields mowed and lined for tournament season. 

$50 a month can help cover teacher and coach salaries.

$100 a month can help provide nutritious meals for youth to combat the increasing food insecurity.

2023 Programs Are up and Running

By Laura Polynice

After a quiet fall on the PLH campus, programs are back up and running! 

This fall was plagued by a long gas shortage which meant the PLH staff couldn’t keep up with the grass on the soccer fields and English students and teachers couldn’t find transportation to come to class. While soccer and English had to take a break, the youth artisan class was able to continue throughout the fall, a champion in Oregon provided a 7-week personal finance course for the staff via zoom, and PLH grew in partnership with the 15 churches in the area. 

January brought fuel and with it increased programming on the campus.

The soccer academy is back to practicing every weekday afternoon and every Saturday morning. More than 80 players from the community and surrounding area participate in the PLH soccer academy. Our coaches and staff have noticed a decline in the players’ nutrition. Like most of the country, our players are suffering from food insecurity. In response, the academy now provides a meal to the players each Saturday and game day, and once the PLH kitchen is operational, we will provide a meal with each practice. The players are excited to be back to regular practices, grateful to receive a meal, and motivated by several matches on the schedule. 

English classes are also back in session. Every Saturday, there are three classes that meet on the campus: Level 1, Level 2, and a specialized advanced course on Teaching English as a Foreign Language. Students continue to be motivated to learn despite all the challenges and obstacles before them. 

The artisan class continues to provide youth with skills in artisan crafts including beading, weaving, soap making, and more. 

Watch for an update soon on the Valentine’s Dinner PLH hosted for couples from the community. 

While the challenges in Haiti continue, we are thankful to again have soccer, English, and other activities happening on the campus every day. Please continue to pray for Haiti and for the community of Camp Marie. 

FIRST RELIEF VENTURE - WORKING AS A COMMUNITY

Athletics, job skills training, community development and disaster preparedness. These are the four areas of Project Living Hope’s work. This past fall, a disaster hit PLH's Haitian community for the first time since we began our work in Camp Marie. The political situation in the country created what Haitians refer to as “Peyi Lok” or “Locked Country.” During this time, individuals could not get to work, kids could not go to school, prices rose and resources became hard to find, much less buy. The time came for PLH to join with community leaders to devise a plan for relief. What followed was 6 weeks of collaboration and partnership between PLH leaders and Haitian staff, local leaders and pastors, and you, the PLH champions. Together, you raised over $17,000. Your generous giving financed the plans which were carried out through unified effort within the community of Camp Marie. We are proud of how our Haitian staff stepped up to manage this project and how the pastors, farmers and working individuals came together to accomplish something that benefited all. It is never our goal to bring attention to PLH and what we may accomplish. It is our goal to support and empower local leaders and the greater community to accomplish great things for their community. We appreciate all of you who stepped up to support and pray for this project. We appreciate the nine churches who carried out the purchase and distribution of food and facilitated the agreement with the farmers. We loved seeing God bring together the community of Camp Marie and the community of PLH champions to accomplish all of this.

ATHLETIC CAMPS FOR KIDS

Kids were happy to participate in six weeks of organized soccer and basketball training where they were able to play a game they love, practice new things, develop their skills, and learn from trained coaches. We hired three local soccer coaches and three young men who participated in our basketball coach training to organize these camps for the kids.

I want to say thank you Project Living Hope. Right now, I teach sports and Bible to children in my community. I work  very hard to change my community because sport has the power to change Haiti. I am a Life Coach. I work for God. May God continue to protect you and give you strength.

Coach Robenson Beauger

ENGLISH CAMP FOR KIDS

With school being canceled for several months, we saw a need to provide kids in the community with an opportunity to learn and participate in consistent activities. We hired three students from our English class to lead English kids camp for six weeks. Angelot, Rival, and Snyson did a great job providing the kids with a fun, positive learning environment. Together, the children learned about the alphabet, numbers, family, the calendar, and more.

All the kids in Camp Marie are very clever, even if they are also talkative. They are very funny.

Rival Asseil

EMPLOYMENT

Through this effort, 120 individuals from the community were able to earn a much needed day's wage by working on the PLH land. This pay helped them purchase food and other essentials for their families during this difficult time. Each work day, individuals came together in unity, worked hard to accomplish a task, and walked away with the means to provide for others and the knowledge that they had done honest work.

This is the first job I’ve had like this. They pay you well.  They give you food. It’s a good job.

Fritz Jean Louis

FOOD RELIEF

The nine churches of Camp Marie and 45 local farmers came together with PLH in a unified effort to help alleviate some of the food needs within the community. Your generous giving allowed for the churches to provide 1,100 families with food packages. The 45 farmers have planted beans, tomatoes, potatoes, okra, and other vegetables and will be giving 50% of the harvest back to the community through the oversight of the local churches.

We are happy for the great work you are doing in the community. We in the church are delighted to say thank you to everyone who is involved in this great project and for this beautiful help you gave us. We were very happy when we received this help, because the economic situation in the country is very difficult at this time. We did everything we needed to do, and each person was happy when they received the provisions. We ask that God bless you for the good work this project is doing in our area. 

Pastor Jean Ernest Gracia

DISCIPLESHIP

Discipleship is a key focus of Project Living Hope. We train, equip and empower our staff and coaches to grow in their faith so they can share their faith with the people we serve. We choose strong Christian leaders to serve in our ministry who are excited about their faith and want to use their gifts to bring others to Christ.

Crisis Relief Effort Update

We want to say a huge thank you to all those who gave and prayed for the recent crisis relief effort. Together, you raised over $17,000 to provide food relief through our church partners, jobs on the PLH property, seeds for farmers to plant in the community, and English and sport camps for kids. Through this project, we witnessed two communities, that of Camp Marie and that of the PLH supporters, come together to accomplish something that brought hope, encouragement, and opportunity to so many.

Here is a short message from PLH Camp Marie Operations Manager, Benedic Maxime.

Things have begun to calm down in Haiti. Most schools have reopened. People are able to return to work. Resources are being distributed once again. Though we do not know what the next month has in store for Haiti, we are thankful for the current relative peace and we rejoice for what God, through you, was able to give to Camp Marie these past couple months: jobs, food, hope, and a more united community. 

Here is a video showing twenty individuals that were hired for short-term work on the PLH land.

Here is a look at the kids’ English camp as they learn the ABC's.

Watch your mailbox for a full update with more photos and details!

THANK YOU! Crisis Relief Effort Update

We want to say a huge THANK YOU to all those who have given to the PLH Haiti crisis relief effort. We are so excited to announce that we reached our unpublished goal of $10,000! This money is directly impacting the community of Camp Marie in a variety of ways.

Emergency Food Relief:
Funds will be sent to the churches this week for the purchasing and distributing of food to families in need within the community.

Youth Programs:
Individuals from our English classes and soccer and basketball coaches clinics have been selected to run the youth programs which are beginning this week!

English Teachers from left to right: Angelot, Snyson, Rival

Employment:
The first team of locals completed the first work day on the PLH land! More teams will be hired for work days in the coming weeks.

Planting for Tomorrow:
Farmers and PLH leaders will meet to arrange the planting of fast turn around crops which will help to provide food to the community in the coming months.

Please continue to keep Haiti and these projects in your prayers over the coming weeks. We will be sending you another update in the coming weeks so you can see what is happening and how your gifts and prayers are impacting the community of Camp Marie.

It's not too late to join this campaign with your gift.

If you missed the initial email, click here to read the full story.

“Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” Matthew 25:40