Barbados Community Foundation makes donation to Dominica

The Barbados Community Foundation (BCF) recently presented a cheque for Bds$102 000 to the CDEMA Coordinating Unit (CU) to go towards repair work on four medical centres in Dominica, which suffered extensive damage during the passage of Hurricane Maria last year.

Accepting the donation from Sarah Clarke, Project and Donations Coordinator with the BCF, and Claire Jordan also of the BCF, Ronald Jackson, Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) explained that the CDEMA CU will provide oversight of the repairs on the medical centres. His comments came during a brief handover ceremony held at the CDEMA Coordinating Unit, Resilience Way, Lower Estate, St. Michael yesterday.

Jackson stressed that recovery and reconstruction takes several years before a country can actually get back to a situation of pre-hurricane impact. He also noted that efforts to rebuild the country are ongoing and from the time the BCF signalled its intention to assist Dominica since late last year, CDEMA worked with the government there to identify areas of critical need, and the health sector emerged as one which required a great deal of support.

“After months of negotiations with the Ministry of Health in Dominica, we are pleased to be at this point to receive the support on behalf of the people and government in Dominica and the health sector from the Barbados Community Foundation, and I just want to assure them that CDEMA will do all in our power to ensure that the projects are off and running and completed to the quality and standard we expect,” Mr. Jackson commented.

“Our focus really is on building back better and we stand with the Government who have themselves begun a process of revising their existing standards, to ensure that the projects that are being rolled out in Dominica are taking into effect the new standards for roofing, the new standards for construction and we will follow suit and ensure that our projects that we are supporting are doing likewise,” the CDEMA’S Executive Director added.

Sarah Clarke of the BCF meanwhile pointed out that although the Foundation’s mandate primarily focuses on assisting Barbados and to date $7 million has been donated to worthwhile causes here on the island, the private charitable foundation at times raises funds to help its neighbours. Given the devastation wrought on Dominica due to Hurricane Maria last year, Sir Paul Altman, a trustee of the BCF reached out to his friends and associates to raise the BDS $102 000 to help with the rebuilding efforts, she explained.

“CDEMA has been extremely good at helping identifying which clinics to work on and will take on the roll of overseeing the works in Dominica. The medical centres selected for repairs are Castle Bruce Medical Centre, St. Joseph Medical Centre, Grand Fond Medical Centre and Salisbury Medical Centre,” Clarke revealed, while noting that a focus was placed on restoring medical clinics as a means of helping to restore health services in communities.