Three members of First United Methodist Chuch of Warren are leaving home to help the relief effort in Haiti.
However, their help won't be on the ground at Port au Prince.
Instead, Richard Fitch, Cheryl Devereaux and Debbie Crone are off to distribution depots for The United Methodist Church Committee on Relief (UMCOR). Crone and Devereaux are heading to the Sager Brown Depot in Louisiana while Fitch is going to the West Depot in Salt Lake City, Utah.
According to church member Dara Sterling, the role of the volunteers at the depot is to verify all of the donations which will be heading to Haiti. The verification process allows the packages to go through checks at customs with little to no problems.
"Currently, everything is going to Haiti," Sterling said of the depot donations.
The donations are usually in the form of kits. For example, health kits consist of a hand towel, wash cloth, comb, fingernail clippers, bars of soap, toothbrush and Band-Aids.
Crone said she is looking forward to the experience she will gain from the trip.
Asked why she wanted to get involved, Devereaux said, "Now that I'm retired, I wanted to be more active. I always wanted to do something like this but never had the time."
The time the three volunteers will give at the depots is one component of the relief effort local United Methodist Church members are offering.
Sterling volunteered time at one of the depots last year and said it was noticeable where more help could be offered.
"I noticed that no one sent bags to put their kits in," she said.
The observation sparked an idea for a church-wide project. Since fall, approximately 22 volunteers have been sewing together bags for the kits.
"We did over 300 bag," Sterling said with pride.
In addition to making the bags, the church members have also been collecting the items for health and school kits.
The volunteers' scheduled trip, the creation of the bags and the collection of the kit items began before the 7.0 magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti's capital. However, Sterling noted that the activities of UMCOR allow church members to volunteer in some form.
Quoting another church member, Sterling said, "We need players, people like Debbie and Cheryl. We need payers, people who are willing to donate not just money but items for the kits or cloth for the bags. And we need prayers."
Members of the United Methodist Church are accepting donations for the construction of the bags as well as the items for the kits. For more information, call 723-4930.
