Last Tuesday, members of the Walden Rotary Club as well as the Fox Hill Community gathered at Montgomery Self Storage to load supplies bound for the mountain communities of Chermaitre, Haiti.

The Walden Rotary Club did this project together partnering with the Vassar Haiti Project (VHP) and with assistance of fourteen other rotary clubs including the Rotary Club of Gonaives in Haiti. The Walden Club first supported the Haitian village by donating money to the Vassar Haiti Project, assisting them to build a solar-powered lab for the refrigeration of vaccines as well as other diagnostic machines. Walden Rotarians Michael Bliss, Keith Hunter and Peter Sullivan sat down for breakfast last year at Alexis Diner with Pere Andre Wildaine, VHP’s partner on the ground in Haiti, to discuss how they could be of further assistance.

“What else can we do to help?” Bliss asked Wildaine.

Wildaine noted that the Haitian village urgently needed medical and school supplies. Last Tuesday, the Walden Rotary Club fulfilled Wildaine’s wish and much more.
The Club, along with members of the Fox Hill Community, loaded school supplies and furniture, hospital linens and medical supplies, school backpacks and classroom supplies as well as soccer balls and pumps into a 40-foot container. The Walden Rotary Club had been collecting and purchasing the items for a year, which will travel by boat to Haiti this week.

Founded in 2001, the VHP operates as a three-way partnership. They are a student-centered education program based at Vassar College. The project seeks to broaden the global perspective of and cultivate global citizenship among its student volunteers. Participants are faced with real life circumstances and challenges in which to practice and apply their curricular learning. Students are taught how to navigate differences in order to make positive changes in the world.

Bi-annual trips are taken to Chermaitre, Fiervil and Port-au-Prince, Haiti but have had to be canceled over the past couple of years due to political turmoil and the COVID-19 pandemic. The trips are led by project co-founders Lila and Andrew Meade. Spring trips include students from Vassar College as well as board members. Fall trips have included Medical Advisory Board members, community volunteers, as well as Vassar students and alumni.

In addition to being a student-centered education project, the VHP is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization incorporated in the State of New York. They buy and sell original art from Haiti. The proceeds of art sales, grants and donations provide the funding to support sustainable development initiatives in Chermaitre, Haiti.

The VHP partners with community organizations, institutions and businesses in both educating and raising awareness about Haitian culture and society.

Chermaitre, the destination of Walden Rotary Clubs’ supplies, will benefit from the goods they will be receiving. The village is only accessible by foot up a steep mountain trail. There are no roads, electricity or running water.

About 500 families populate Chermaitre and almost all are subsistence farmers, with their products being their sole source of food and trade value in the local markets. Over 250 children attend a primary school in the village built by the VHP in 2008.

VHP co-founder Lila Meade expressed gratitude for all the work that the Walden Rotary Club has done.

“First and foremost it’s their trust in the work that we’re doing,” she said. “Trust is always the most important thing to us because while money is important it’s the belief in your work that is really critical. Secondly, being able to work with so many dedicated, energetic and passionate people from that club has been truly a privilege.”