Written by hedir on 19 May 2009
Since 1996 I’ve been running the HEDIR web page off my desktop (converted to a server). It has served me well but the recent storm here in southern Illinois illustrated the need to have this operating off-site. Effective yesterday (May 18) we’ve moved the main HEDIR page to an off-site server. The www.hedir.org still exists but you will now be diverted to a different appearing web page–one that hopefully will address future needs. I’m still operating all of the HEDIR services (the HEDIR listserv, the HEDIR blog, the HEDIR people/photo page, the HEDIR wiki, etc.). It’s just that the main page will be hosted elsewhere. You’ll note that many of the links will go back to my server (you can tell this because the link is something like www.kittle.siu.edu/hedir/…). Eventually more of the items will be moved onto the new HEDIR server, but one step at a time.
Written by hedir on 14 May 2009
For those interested, I’ve uploaded a series of videos that my daughter or I have shot of the damage done by Hurricane SOIL (my name for this storm). These have not been edited and my daughter is not a professional video operator so bear that in mind. The videos don’t do justice to the damage in this area. About 1/3 of the population are still without power.
In addition, I’ve captured the radar on that day…one can clearly see the Hurricane shape of this storm.
Go to www.kittle.siu.edu/hedir/soil to view.
Written by hedir on 11 May 2009
Well it’s been 4 days since Carbondale has been hit with an ‘inland hurricane’. This area has suffered bad weather and the impact of hurricane from the gulf–most of those have turned into just a tropical depression by the time they get here. We received the full impact (I’m not sure what a 108 MPH hurricane is classified) but it has left substantial damage.
A few things I’ve noticed. I’ve limited my driving because most gas stations have limited service. When I drove around today I only saw three stations opened. Almost all banks, businesses and restaurants are closed. Power is almost totally out in Carbondale; however some outlaying areas do have power. We’re the only ones in the neighborhood to have power…don’t know why.
My drive around campus and the city showed just some incredible damage. It appears that the winds did some damage to the structures (mostly windows and awnings) but the big damage were the trees that were uprooted and thrown against buildings. In the old parts of Carbondale some homes have been completely demolished.
There is no power on campus; they’ve closed the campus for today…most likely will tomorrow. We were to start our intersession summer classes, but that has been delayed. My intersession class starts in two weeks so the chances are that this class will be held is pretty good. I’m concerned about the faculty who were to start teaching this week. It’ll be interesting to see if those classes are not taught if faculty will be given their salary (summer school is VERY important at SIU–it is one way to make up for our below average salaries).
I did a more thorough assessment on our property. We have about 4.5 acres (with about 2 acres as woods). We have 6 down in our yard (fortunately they fell away from the house) and nearly 25 in the woods (I only county major size trees). It’s just incredible the amount of destruction this storm had…trees were just shattered, snapped and uprooted…and these were big trees. When my server is back on-line I’ll post some videos of our area.
I chopped up two of the trees today. It took about 6 hours. Tomorrow I’ll plan to remove two more (they’re a little smaller) and Wednesday I’m planning on removing the other two–those will be very tricky because they’re tall trees that will need to be dropped properly.
We’ll keep you all posted as I hear things.
Written by hedir on 09 May 2009
I’ve just returned home (today is Saturday), one day after Southern Illinois suffered a hurricane…I kid you not. We had an inland hurricane.
On Friday morning I was driving up to the University of Illinois at Champaign/Urbana for my 7th graders State Science Fair. We left Carbondale around 9:00 am. From Carbondale to Champaign it is about 200 miles…about 3 hours. Around 10:30 we received notification that Carbondale had a tornado warning. Torrential rains, strong winds, but little damage from the tornado.
Around 1:30 my cell phone alerted me that once again Jackson County was having a severe thunderstorm warning. I went on my blackberry’s internet to view the radar and it looked just like a hurricane. It had the familiar eye, the wrap around colors and it was heading directly into our county.
One hour later I head that Carbondale, and SIU were seriously damaged by winds up to 108 miles per hour. Everything we heard that day was from second hand source…we were three hours away. We thought about coming back but the state patrol told us that all major routes were closed. Apparently down trees, downed power lines, and tipped over semi-trucks blocked all major routes. So we stayed put. Our neighbors came down to assess our home. We lost about 6 big trees, but not one hit our house. Our shed lost some gutters and shingles but that was it. We were extremely lucky. Those neighbors had a big tree land on their house. Most other neighbors had damage to their homes as well. The street had about 8 MASSIVE trees laying across…while we were resting in the luxury of electricity, warm food, and cold drinks my neighbors were wrestling with no power, no water, and massive damage. Doesn’t quite sound fair, does it.
Most of Saturday morning was agonizing as I helped judge the science fair and had a number of my daughter’s classmates go through the judging process. Most wanted to be home…not sure what would be left. Finally at 12:30 we were able to hit the road. About 2 hours north of Carbondale we stopped and purchased canned food, water, and other essentials. We had heard that nothing was open and when places were opened it was cash only.
We arrived into the Carbondale area around 4:30. Most of the promotional signs (i.e., McDonald’s, Burger King) were down. Many, many trees were just splintered. Hundreds of trees were lying on the power lines. Many buildings had roof damage, one was completely flattened. We pulled into our rural subdivison and the damage really hit home. Trees that were hundreds of years old had been thrown onto our road, but the neighbors toiled the past 24 hours and were able to cut the trees so that the road was passable–barely, but passable. These were huge trees.
Our house had about 10 major trees down (about 6 in the yard and around 4 major ones in our woods). There is probably another dozen or two that were damaaged but the woods is so thick we can’t see. We get the generator going and start running the downstairs refrigerator. Estimates are that power will not be obtained for days (perhaps Wednesday or Thursday of next week). My daughter and I drive into town to see the damage, and to drop off a hand-crank radio to a friend, when half way through our trip my wife calls and says we have power. We’re the ONLY household in the rural subdivison that has power. We’re keeping most lights out…after all we don’t want to rub our neighbors noses in it.
The damage in Carbondale is substantial, but the good news is that most of it are trees and damaged power lines. There were many homes with large trees on their roofs, but from what we say the damage could have been much, much worse.I couldn’t see much more because we were closing in on the curfew that Carbondale set (8:00 pm to 8:00 am). Most of the damage on campus were relatively superficial. Trees, signs, and many windows blown out on the high-rise towers.
Now, the clean up for me starts tomorrow.
Written by hedir on 07 May 2009
Here is another in my episodic blog posts in support of the HEDIR Blog. As I have been transitioning between jobs and, in my spare time as a volunteer have also been working hard to help a mid-sized nonprofit manage in this fiscal crisis. This post is a collision between my work, volunteer life and personal passion.
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The title of this blog is “Nobody can do everything, but everybody can do something” and is taken from the lyrics of a song by Gil Scott Heron. I chose it because I have come to recognize how important we are in these crazy times of economic, moral, and social uncertainty.
Last week I was in New Orleans at a national conference for Reclaiming Futures, the project I am transitioning into. While I was in my hotel room, ironing my shirt, President Obama was on the TV, telling us that he asked Congress Tuesday to include $1.5 billion in the 2009 supplemental budget to respond to a potential swine flu outbreak. On that day there were about 40-50 confirmed cases and I am not sure the first US. fatality had yet happened. A few hours later I am listening to Marian Wright Edelman talking eloquently about the Cradle to Prison Pipeline. I was staggered as I was reminded of the statistics that every year over 3000 children and teens die from gunfire and more than five times as many children and teens suffer non-fatal gun injuries. And I asked myself: Where is our press conference? Where is our national mobilization of the public health community? Where is our 1.2 Billion dollars?
All the while I was in New Orleans my email had the constant back and forth about budget cuts facing the community mediation center where I serve as a volunteer board chair. The agency’s city contract for neighborhood mediation and conflict facilitation services is facing a 20-50% budget cut. The County Contract for juvenile victim offender mediation was eliminated, despite the fact that such programs have an evidence-base suggesting an $8 return for every dollar invested. The agency’s state contract now faces a 20% cut in the best case scenario. And this is an agency with a diverse funding base.
And sitting at my desk, I read that “The Council on Foundations survey of 430 foundations in March found that 62 percent expect to reduce their grant making this year. Almost half of the respondents said they will decrease their giving budgets by more than 10 percent.”
So together the cuts across the government and Foundation sector made me realize that our social service community infrastructure is in need of you and me. And at point I recalled the lyrics of Gil Scott Heron’s song Work for Peace:
I don’t want to sound like no late night commercial,
but its a matter of fact that there are thousands of children all over the world
in Asia and Africa and in South America who need our help.
When they start talking about 55 cents a day and 70 cents a day,
I know a lot of folks feel as though that,
that’s not really any kind of contribution to make,
but we had to give up a dollar and a half just to get in the subway nowadays.
So this is a song about tomorrow and about how tomorrow can be better.
Nobody can do everything,
but everybody can do something,
everyone must play a part,
everyone got to go to work,
Work for Peace.
While the economy has taken out large number of people, including some of those on this list, many of us remain. Still accruing time in our State or University pension plans, refinancing our homes at sub 5% rates and still paying $3 or $4 for a non-fat, skinny latte with an extra shot. Fair trade and organic of course. So now I am not talking to those who are behind on their mortgages, just out of school with crushing debt or those struggling to stay insured. I am talking to those of us who remain. On this list we are health educators working for the public good. But it is not good enough just to do good as professionals. We are also community members and have a responsibility outside of our work. We need to be citizens and engaged and during this time and be engaged just a little more because right now, a little more is needed.
So here is the deal. I am asking this list to take up a challenge. Find 1-3 nonprofit agencies to donate to and for the next 3 months donate $30 per month to support the group or groups you identify. But it needs to be money you weren’t already planning on donating. It needs to the “just a little more.” Think about it. That’s $90 in 90 days. I figure on half of those days I spend $2 on a cup of coffee so I can be kinder to my body and support my community without doing anything dramatic in my lifestyle except to live a little more consciously and a little more intentionally. So there is the challenge.
Here is the vision. According to the HEDIR Directory there are almost 3,250 folks willing to self-identify as members. If only 20% of us took up this challenge that would be 650 contributions of $90 or this list would give back $58,500 to the community. Now imagine one more thing. If we each could get one additional person to take up this challenge we would then be talking about well over $100,000. Not quite a $1.2 billion dollar infusion but as a member of a board of a local nonprofit I know the value of each one trying to reach one. Nobody can do everything but everybody can do something.
So there is the challenge and the vision. Now it is time for action. Before you click close, open another browser window and make your first donation (and tell the agency know why you are giving to them). Then calendar the next two donations. One in June and one in July. Better yet make a repeating donation to an agency. $90 in 90 days. It’s time to work for peace.
Mark
PS: My first donation is to Resolutions Northwest the community mediation center where I chair the board. My $30 to them is above and beyond my board pledge. For my friends and colleagues in the Portland area (heck, any of you looking for a cause), I would urge you to consider donating to Resolutions Northwest as they are doing great work for social justice. You can Donate Here.
Pss. My next two will include an environmental organization and an music arts organization.
