July 28, 2010

WASHINGTON, DC – Massive shelter issues, the need for local procurement, improved engagement with civil society, and additional funding head the list of requirements for successful reconstruction in Haiti, a group of Haitian and U.S. advocates told members of Congress and interfaith leaders in two Washington events yesterday.

Speaking before a hearing of the Congressional Black Caucus in Washington on Tuesday, and during a morning interfaith breakfast, Camille Chalmers, Executive Director of Plateforme Haitienne de Plaidoyer pour un Developpement Alternatif (PAPDA – Haitian Platform to Advocate for Alternative Development), stressed the need for greater involvement of civil society in the devastated country's recovery, saying, "despite this great wealth of national expertise … reconstruction planning has been quite exclusive" to date.

PAPDA's Chalmers highlighted the role of a number of Haitian civil society groups, including those that focus on rural and agricultural development, women's movements, and cooperatives and micro-finance initiatives, as important civil society counterparts who should be actively engaged in consultation around recovery and reconstruction in Haiti.

He called for the creation of "formal structures that can open the dialogue in Haiti between civil society and the State."

In opening statements at the hearing, CBC member Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) characterized efforts to address the "entanglement" of land and legal issues preventing people from re-establishing themselves in more permanent shelters in Haiti. Calling those efforts "anemic and overly bureaucratic," Jackson Lee said that more should be done by the U.S. to demand progress from the Haitian government and added that "The Congressional Black Caucus means business... we intend to hold ourselves accountable and everyone else."

Hearing presenter Dr. Rajiv Shah, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, said the U.S. would like to do more and emphasized the importance of receiving supplemental funds for ongoing humanitarian and development assistance in Haiti.

As if on cue, last night, after being held up for weeks as the House and Senate went back and forth on what to include in the supplemental funding package, the House approved a version of a supplemental funding bill designating $918 million in assistance to Haiti and $460 million to fund USAID's Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA) programs that provide emergency assistance to Haiti and other disaster-affected countries globally.

The Haiti allocations for humanitarian and development assistance were included in Congress' overall $59 billion war supplemental bill.

Also attending the CBC hearing were Dr. Paul Farmer, Deputy Special Envoy for Haiti, United Nations; Loune Viaud, Director of Strategic Planning and Operations, Zanmi Lasante / Partners in Health, Haiti; and Ira Kurzban, Esq., Chair, Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti.

Farmer, founder of Partners in Health, has been working in Haiti for about three decades. He urged that the strategies employed by the U.S. during the Great Depression be used as a pattern for jobs creation in rebuilding Haiti.

Representative Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), a member of the Black Caucus, told hearing attendees that "political decisions" were being made rather than decisions in the best interest of the Haitian people, including the decision to end mass distributions of emergency food aid through the World Food Program. Waters urged USAID and Administrator Shah to find ways to support the nutritional needs of Haitians by procuring food locally to support, rather than compete with, local agriculture markets.

Donna Derr, Humanitarian and Development Program Director for humanitarian agency Church World Service (CWS), agrees that local procurement is one way to support both Haitians in need of emergency food assistance and local farmers whose prices might otherwise be depressed by the arrival of free foreign foodstuffs. "After working with farming communities in Haiti for several decades, we see local procurement as a cornerstone of sustainable recovery of the agriculture sector."

The plea for local procurement was heard earlier at Tuesday morning's interfaith breakfast with members of Haitian civil society who later presented at the CBC briefing. The breakfast was co-sponsored by Church World Service and other members of the Haiti Advocacy Working Group whose members also helped make arrangements for the CBC briefing later in the day.

"We were heartened by the intensity of commitment by CBC members, who stated their desire to take these concerns and recommendations for relief and reconstruction in Haiti all the way to President Obama," said Jessica Eby, Protection Officer for the CWS Immigration and Refugee Program, who attended the hearing. "Their support, coupled with quick dispensation of U.S. supplemental funds for Haiti and ongoing monitoring of the situation are all key roles Congress can and should play in Haiti's recovery."

CBC members attending the hearing included Representatives Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), Charles Rangel (D-New York), John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.), Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.), Sheila Jackson-Lee, CBC Whip Yvette Clarke (D-New York), Maxine Waters, William Lacey Clay, Jr. (D-Mo.), Al Green (D-Tex.), Donna M. Christensen (D-U.S. Virgin Islands), Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), as well as Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.).

Church World Service