Dedicated volunteers from Zurich North America, the St. Bernard Project, and local nonprofit Friends of Rockawayworked to rebuild a home on Channel Road in Broad Channelfrom 2 p.m. on Tuesday October 28th straight through until the same time the following day.
To do this, Zurich, an international insurance agency, sought out a partnership with the St. Bernard Project, of which Friends of Rockaway is a local affiliate.
The collaborative trio came to Broad Channel to aid in the reconstruction of the Stack family’s home. Doreen Stack, a single mother of two, has been a resident of Broad Channel for 18 years. The hurricane rendered their home unlivable. After the storm, Doreen and her children were left without water, food, heat and other basic amenities, including a bathroom and kitchen. Despite this major setback, the Stack family has managed to remain on their property, living in a trailer adjacent to the wreckage.
Thanks to the support of Zurich, the family got to witness an intense rehabilitation over the course of a single day’s time.
The St. Bernard Project was born in 2006 after Liz McCartney and Zack Rosenburg saw the “tremendous needs, yet solvable problems” in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. They also responded to the May 2011 EF-5 Tornado in Joplin, Missouri.
In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, the operation came to New York and New Jersey to help storm-affected families bounce back. The non-profit mobilizes AmeriCorps members, volunteers, and labor from within the organization to dodge the need for subcontractors and cheapen construction costs, providing alternative paths to recovery for those in need. Bearing a common mission, the St. Bernard Project and Friends of Rockaway joined forces to ensure continued housing reconstruction progress across the peninsula.
Last year, to mark the first anniversary of the storm, Zurich accomplished their first 24-hour rebuild of a home in Staten Island’s Midland Beach. Doreen Stack is the second one to receive this kind of accelerated assistance.
It took three back-to-back eight-hour shifts of volunteers.
Intense devastation can happen in an instant, but it always takes extended periods of time to recover. This endeavor was a way to reverse damage as fast as it had originally occurred.
It has been two-years since the storm displaced many, and there is still work to be done in re-establishing stability. Feats like this one provide a boost of morale to the recovery effort at large, and demonstrate that it is still very much alive. Regeneration is ongoing.
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