Adrian Morning Rotary Members Preparing for Service Trip to Puerto Rico
On September20, 2017 a strong category 4 hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico. The storm caused an estimated 90 billion dollars in damage and approximately 3,000 deaths. In the following days, Adrian Morning Rotary worked with the local Puerto Rican community to find ways to assist the island in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.
As clean up continued into 2018, an idea hatched to have a local contingent of the club and interested community members travel to Puerto Rico to work on a project with a local club. The mission of the trip was simple, to spend money in the communities we visited and to build fellowship with fellow Rotarians. Phone calls, emails, and Facebook messages led to a firm idea...work with the Rotary Club of Añasco to enhance the local school in February 2020. Four individuals signed up, committing their own funds to cover the cost of travel and lodging in Puerto Rico for a long weekend of service work.
The plans changed on January 7 when a series of earthquakes spiked with a magnitude 6.4. The tremors knocked out power and water services, as well as created damages to buildings, rock slides, and loss of life. Recent contact with local Rotarians and continued earthquake activity has led to a shift in our travel mission. While we still plan on stimulating the economy through local purchases and tourism, we will be working on disaster relief on the “front lines”.
Get Involved: If you would like to help us with our mission, we suggest you consider making a donation to the Adrian Morning Rotary Club (PO Box 544, Adrian, MI 49221) with a notation that the funds are for “Puerto Rico”. Your dollars will be used in Puerto Rico with earthquake clean up, purchase of relief supplies, and assisting in the rebuilding process.
