Sending a $10 text message is helpful, but Portlander Jeff Lorton takes “proactive” to a whole new level. He woke up last Wednesday morning feeling like he had to do something to help Haitians affected by the earthquake. So he made some calls to a freight consolidator, found an old container, and started rounding up donations.
- Jeff Lorton (left) prepares the container for loading.
Right now in a parking lot at SE 13th and Ankeny, dozens of volunteers are packing up donated water, food, medicine, clothing and hygiene products. Lorton and his co-director, Eric Smith, are busy but calm as they coordinate the effort. “We’ve been working since Friday,” says Lorton. “Everything here has been donated.”
Once loaded, the container will travel by truck to Los Angeles, by train to Dallas, and by boat to Kingston, where it will sit waiting for clearance to arrive in Haiti. “It should get there in about six weeks,” Lorton says. “Right now the port’s busted, eh? This is second-wave relief.”
Lorton’s getting the word out through social media, and there’s a Facebook page for the project. He says most of the volunteers today were drawn by a piece in the Oregonian… let’s show them up, Mercury readers. You can stop by to help between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. today through Wednesday.
OH hey! Look misguided white people with no experience with disaster relief doing less than helpful stuff!
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/haiti/1…
These people would be better off doing some sort of large scale garage sale rather than shipping a container box full of random stuff.
But hey! PDXers love to help! Even when they’re clueless.
“Donating stuff instead of money is a serious problem in emergency relief. Only the people on the ground know what’s actually necessary; those of us in the rest of the world can only guess. Some things, like summer clothes and expired medicines are going to be worthless in Haiti. Other stuff, like warm clothes and bottled water may be helpful to some people in some specific ways. Separating the useful from the useless takes manpower that can be doing more important work. It’s far better to give money so that organizations can buy the things they know they need.”
http://aidwatchers.com/2010/01/nobody-want…
The negativity here is amazing. Jeff Lorton is in direct contact with an agency, Lifeline, already in Haiti. This agency has provided guidelines as to what is needed in Haiti and will receive the container in 4-6 weeks. I was on the front lines yesterday and 30 of us separated the useful from the useless (using the guidelines provided by Lifeline) with speed and efficiency. Donations were not randomly boxed…food, baby (formulas, diapers, etc.) hygiene/medical, and a small amount of clothing were all boxed and paletted in their categories. People came out of the woodwork to donate and help. Most donations received were new. US Bank is matching dollar for dollar…making this grassroots venture truly worthwhile. The shipping logistics have been arranged. This huge container will be full of food, hygiene supplies, baby formulas, etc. Do you have any idea how much fits in a 40 foot container? A lot. There is a place for all generosity and to fault Jeff Lorton is ridiculous. I agree–relief effort donations need to be guided by people who know exactly what the needs are. That is exactly what Jeff Lorton has done, by coordinating with Lifeline. One can only think the majority of relief efforts and funds will go to Port-Au-Prince but this container will go to rural areas. Mr. Lorton personally purchased the container before the former presidents asked for money. He made things happen fast. Good going, Jeff Lorton, and the hundreds of people who came to donate and help.
I agree that there is no place for negativity here. Speaking to Graham, things like “summer clothes” that you deem useless are actually quite useful as weather in Haiti is in the high 80’s right now, I think they have no current use for my Portland sweaters.
Please stop nay-saying folks, not everyone has money to contribute, but most of us can come to the table with what we have, and I don’t think that makes us all clueless white people.
Be nice & do what you can.
Sorry, I was speaking to Ben earlier about the summer clothes. Graham was just being an a-hole, I have nothing much to say to that.
These comments crack me up. Little do you know how successfully it all went down.
Not just one, but TWO 40 foot containers were filled by Jeff and crew (and all awesome Portlanders who ACT instead of TALK), AND were among the first containers to arrive at their final destination, through a port Jeff found that had not been destroyed by the earthquake. Jeff’s a do-er. Now go back to bed Graham.