Dear Friends,
We have revised the our press release to acknowledge the generous support to Build Change and J/P HRO from the World Bank and Bureau de Mon�tisation de Programme d'Aide au D�veloppement (BMPAD). Their support was instrumental in implementing and completing this project, and we apologize for this oversight.
Best regards,
The Build Change Team
Build Change Completes Permanent Housing for 97 Families in Haiti With Partner J/P HRO:
Partnership Is Expanded to Reach 280 Additional Families With Permanent Housing
(DENVER, January 18, 2013) Build Change recently completed a pilot project in partnership with J/P Haitian Relief Organization (J/P HRO), funded by the World Bank and administered through the Bureau de Mon�tisation de Programme d'Aide au D�veloppement (BMPAD), to provide technical assistance and training for retrofitting damaged homes using a homeowner-driven approach. Through this project, Build Change worked with 400 people displaced by the destructive earthquake to move back into their neighborhoods in safe, earthquake-resistant, permanent housing.
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| A Build Change trainer teaches builders how to bend steel bars. |
With the goal of getting families into safe, permanent housing quickly and effectively, Build Change worked with homeowners to retrofit their damaged homes. More than 120 homeowners, including neighbors and family members, attended Build Change's training on safe construction. The organization first taught them about the fundamentals of earthquake-resistant design and construction and what to look for in terms of quality construction materials during the reconstruction process. Each homeowner then met with Build Change to design a house that met their needs. Because the homeowners were involved in the process, many contributed funds to the project, purchased their own materials and managed the retrofit under the supervision of Build Change engineers. Build Change also provided practical and on-the-job training to 140 builders about earthquake-safe building techniques and retrofitting practices. As a result, more than 97 families - about 400 people - are now living in a safe house.
"We aim to demonstrate that something fundamentally different can come from a slum in the center of one of the world's poorest cities: secure and sustainable communities," said Gary Philoctete, Deputy Country Director and permanent in-country representative of J/P HRO. "In its collaboration with Build Change, J/P HRO found a great opportunity to address the need for improving construction quality while retrofitting houses. Through the use of onsite trainings for builders and homeowners, the partnership achieved a second strategically important goal: the optimization of resources. The positive feedback of the homeowners and of the wider community, both of whom appreciated the quality of the construction executed under the supervision of Build Change, demonstrates that the important message of the need of building back better has arrived in the community of Delmas 32."
"J/P HRO has been a vital partner in delivering homeowner-driven retrofitting reconstruction services," says Dr. Elizabeth Hausler Strand, Build Change founder and CEO. "When homeowners drive the process and make their own decisions about design and materials, the housing reconstruction is much more successful. Not only is it more cost effective, but it also creates long-term, sustainable change in construction practice."
In 2013, the Build Change - J/P HRO partnership will nearly triple its impact from this initial pilot project, delivering homeowner-driven technical assistance and training to an additional 280 families. Dr. Hausler Strand concludes, "With J/P HRO as our partner, we will continue to make significant progress toward getting thousands more people displaced by the earthquake into permanent housing sustainably and effectively."
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A completed homeowner-driven, retrofit house in Haiti.
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Build Change has been working in Haiti since March 2010 in metropolitan Port-au-Prince and Jacmel, impacting some of the communities most affected by the 2010 earthquake. To date in Haiti, Build Change has trained more than 4,100 homeowners, 2,400 builders, 350 concrete-block manufacturing staffs and 130 engineers, and has helped more than 6,300 people with permanent housing solutions. Build Change has also implemented successful, homeowner-driven, reconstruction projects in Indonesia and China.
About Build Change
Build Change is an international, non-profit social enterprise with a mission to reduce deaths, injuries and economic losses caused by housing collapses due to earthquakes in developing countries. It does this by designing earthquake-resistant houses and training builders, homeowners, engineers, and government officials to build them. Because of Build Change's award-winning design and capacity-building programs in post-earthquake reconstruction programs in Haiti, Indonesia and China, more than 80,000 people are living in safer houses. Visit www.buildchange.org.
About J/P HRO
The mission at J/P Haitian Relief Organization (J/P HRO) is simple: To save lives and bring sustainable programs to the Haitian people quickly and effectively. Since the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010, J/P HRO has been on the ground, working with some of the most vulnerable populations to not only recover from the earthquake but to build a brighter future for themselves, their families and their country. See more of the work we do in Haiti: http://www.jphro.org.
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