Monitor Editor
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS— A local business manager informed the Rotary Club about an organization that provides emergency housing to disaster victims and other displaced families.
Mark Murton, the operations manager for Keystone Heights-based Clear Science spoke to the club remotely and said that tens of thousands of families lose their housing every day.
“It doesn’t always make the news,” he said. “It’s not always a big story, but it happens.”
He told the Rotarians, during their Wednesday, Jan. 26 meeting at the Montgomery Center that the mission of ShelterBox is to provide temporary housing while families rebuild their lives after a disaster.
The U.K.-based international charity was founded by the members of the Rotary Club of Helston-Lizard in Cornwall, England. The idea started as a 1999 project of the club and eventually developed into ShelterBox.
“The Rotarians in Cornwall realized that there was a lot of aid going to natural disasters and conflict areas,” Murton said, adding that most of the aid arrived in the form of food and medicine. “But there was a gap and people sat down and asked: What do families need following a disaster? Shelter came up as one of the fundamentals.”
Murton said ShelterBox maintains a strong relationship with Rotary International today.
Over the last 20 years, the organization has distributed over 2 million housing kits which now come in a large, green plastic box and contain a large tent that can accommodate a family of six, tools to prepare food, a water purification kit, mosquito netting, a solar flashlight and other items to keep warm and dry.
The group also distributes another kit that comes with a tarp instead of a tent, used in urban areas where there is either no need or no room for the pop-ups.
“Tarps sound pretty mundane if you go get them at Home Depot or Lowe’s, no problem,” he said. “But if you have lost your roof but your walls are still standing, a tarp is a pretty valuable thing to have. Maybe one wall of a shelter has been heavily damaged and just needs to break the wind or rain.”
Murton added that obtaining the ShelterBox items is only the first step in getting aid to those in need. Transportation and access to affected areas are also formidable obstacles. He said that many times, the group works with other nonprofits to gain access into a country.
After Murton’s presentation, Keystone Heights Rotary Treasurer Shelly Gibbs recalled that after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the club donated $1,000 to ShelterBox as part of its response to the disaster.
