PH Newsletter 2011

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GPPI Project Honduras Issue 2: December 2011

Instructions on how to donate to Project Honduras can be found on the back page of this newslette

GEORGETOWN PUBLIC POLICYINSTITUTEPROJECT HONDURAS

Establishing a Working Partnership betweenGPPI and the Village of La Colonia Balfate in

the Bay Island of Roatn, Honduras

Our Mission Statement

The mission of Project Honduras is to establish an ongoing, sustainable relationship between the

Georgetown Public Policy Institute and the communities of Roatn, Honduras, by bringing graduatestudents to Roatn several times per year to participate in community outreach and development wor

Project Honduras, a sustainable grassrootsdevelopment project in Roatn, Honduras, wascreated to connect GPPI students to an underservedcommunity and give them the opportunity to usetheir policy skills to create change. Since 2007,GPPI students have worked to develop a

relationship with the residents of Balfate, LaColonia, Roatn. For the last four years, studentshave traveled to the island over Spring Break toimplement ongoing service and developmentprojects, the planning of which engages the studentsthroughout the academic year. Project Honduras isguided by a commitment to building a partnershipwith the residents of Roatn that recognizes their

culture, values, priorities and concerns. Our principalobjective is to leverage the unique assets of theProject Honduras team to provide the people ofRoatn with access to better services and quality oflife through an interdisciplinary approach thatprovides the community with technical expertise and

financial resources.

This year, Project Honduras will be furtheringprevious initiatives, such as improving waterinfrastructure and assisting the local schools andmedical clinic. Details about those projects can befound within this newsletter.

Project Honduras: Who We Are and What We Do

Issue 2: December 2011Contents

PH Team Member Profile.......2

Collaborating with LocalHealth Services .........................3

Mapping Balfate Homes andInfrastructure.............................3

PenPal Program andEducational Assistance............5

Water Storage: Profile of aSustainable Project...................6

The 2010-2011 Project Honduras Team

Continued on page 2


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Georgetown Public Policy Institute 2011


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BuildingRecognition

Project Honduras hasbecome increasingly

engaged with the

community of Balfate,surveying homes and

introducing our groupone house at a time.

Lending a Hand

2010 Project Honduras

members utilized extra

time to help La Coloniawith simple projects like

cleaning and painting a

local primary school.

(Who We Are, continued from front page)

Also, our new team members are developing action plans for potentialprojects that can be started during the upcoming trip in March. We will besure to provide updates as these new initiatives begin to take shape.

Project Honduras is a relatively new initiative, but it has already mademeasurable progress towards achieving its goals. We hope you will take thetime to read this newsletter and learn more about the important work ProjectHonduras is carrying out in Roatn. By focusing on sustainability andmeasurable outcomes, we are striving to make a difference in the quality oflife for the people of Balfate.

For more information about Project Honduras please contact our teamleaders Louise Ashton and Cynthia Brenner [email protected].

- Louise Ashton and C nthia Brenner, MPP 12

Project Honduras Member SpotlightColin Deffet

After enrolling in GPPI this year, Colin wanted to get involved in a student-led project where he could use his experience in Guatemala to make ameaningful contribution. Project Honduras immediately grabbed hisattention for several reasons. His time spent in Central America has madehim an aficionado of the region. Project Honduras also gives him anopportunity to continue building on his strong development and languageskills. Colin was particularly attracted to the Projects role as a vehicle forapplying public policy and development lessons learned in the classroom. Helooks forward to helping continue the unique relationship that the programhas created between a motivated group of young professionals and thecommunity members of Balfate.

Given the uniqueness of Project Honduras among Public Policy schools,Colin is excited to have the opportunity to make a difference helpingcommunities in Latin America by leveraging his new skills from GPPI. Weare excited to have Colin join the Project Honduras team this year and knowwe will benefit from his experience.

After graduating from the University of SouthCarolina in 2008, Colin opted to forgo the traditionaldesk job and joined the Peace Corps. From August2008 to October 2010, he lived in the rural mountainsof indigenous Guatemala, designing andimplementing agriculture-based income generationprojects. While there, he gained first-hand experiencein the developing world, building his problem-solving

capabilities and project management skills.
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


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Innovation in Public Health: Assisting Clinca Esperanza

In the dry season, roads are treacherous slopes of rocks

garbage and other debris. In the rainy season, they becometorrents of water, streaming downhill toward the Gulf ofMexico, a half a mile away. As the local infrastructure cycles

between these two extremes, it can be difficult to discernwhether any given path is an actual road or just another well-

worn hillside.

This is Balfate, a community of about 800 people in La

Colonia, a shantytown on the Honduran island of RoatnThe community is home to workers and their families wholeft behind their lives and homes on the Honduran mainland

for the chance of a better life. They have jobs as taxi driverswaiters, housekeepers essentially anything that needs to bedone to support the local tourism industry, which centers on

the coral reef right offshore. The reef is the second largest inthe world behind only Australias Great Barrier Reef.

During a weeklong visit to Roatn in March 2011, the ProjecHonduras team embarked upon the first thorough survey ofthe village ever performed by a community assistance

organization.

Charting the Community: Evidence of Rapid Growth Straining Water System

Outreach:

2010 Project Honduras

members Michael Kurdylaand Michael Murphy drop

off donated medical supplies

at Clnica Esperanza

Erosion and dangerously steep hillsides present

major challenges to infrastructure such as roadsand water delivery systems

Continued on page 4

Among the most important assets to the people of Roatn is ClnicaEsperanza. This non-profit health clinic is staffed by visiting medical expertsand directed by Peggy Stranges. Nurse Peggy and her team of volunteers

offer a wide range of medical services to low-income residents on the island.

Since more than half of the clinics patients come from the nearby migrantcommunity of La Colonia where Project Honduras operates, our teamannually donates high-demand medical supplies that are used to treat some of

the more common ailments suffered by patients.

On a fact-finding mission last year, project members consulted the clinic to

learn more about the health consequences of poor water quality in La Colonia.Among the most frequently observed problems were parasites, scabies anddehydration. These ailments are often the consequence of bad food

preparation, or in the case of children, of drinking water from unsanitarylocations.

2011-12 Project Honduras Team: Louise Ashton and Cynthia Brenner (Project Leaders),Grace Cho, Rosemarie Clouston, Colin Deffet, Amir Fouad, Traci Johnson, Michael Kurdyla,

Raisa Ledesma, Chris McCall, Matt Rogers, Joe Russell-Jenkins and Rose Tutera


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(La Clnica Esperanza, continued from page 3)

While these problems persist due to insufficient

infrastructure, Clnica Esperanza has found innovative waysto improve other health concerns. The clinic boasts theislands largest pharmacy, which establishes good practicesamong patients through an inexpensive but rationed

dispersion system. In March, Nurse Peggy opened a neo-natalunit with four birthing rooms to go along with the clinics

pre-natal education program. Additionally, the clinic hasdeveloped a RapidCare payment system that generatesrevenue for the clinic by charging modest rates to employerswho want their workers to be treated quickly.

Public health concerns are expected to remain a top policy priority in Roatn going forward. Therefore, Project

Honduras will continue to look for new ways of assisting Nurse Peggy and Clnica Esperanza in the coming years.

-Christopher McCall, MPP 12

(Charting the Community, continued from page 3)

Over the course of three days, team members traversed thehillside in pairs, armed with cameras and notepads todocument the locations of homes, businesses, apartmentbuildings, other dwellings, and undeveloped properties.

Many areas of the community had not been visited byprevious Project Honduras groups, who focused their workon the school just inside the entrance to the community.While initial estimates suggested that there were 90 homesin Balfate, it became obvious via satellite mapping andsurveying that this number was much too low. We foundthat increased migration and development had almostdoubled the number of families living in the area.

Meanwhile, engineers accompanying the team carefullymapped out the communitys water management system,including well locations and distribution zones. Theyrecorded every last foot of PVC piping used to take waterfrom Balfates storage tank to individual homes.

The community map features careful descriptions andlocations for each of the communitys 170 homes. The mapwill prove invaluable for future GPPI teams that work inBalfate as we continue our water intervention and work tomonitor its progress. It will allow the team to match thebaseline survey data collected in March with a follow-upassessment to be completed upon culmination of thehousehold filter intervention. It will also facilitate otherprojects that Project Honduras would like to pursue in thefuture, including infrastructure, health, and nutrition.

- Michael Kurdyla, MPP 13

Above: New waves of migration from the

mainland have led to the rapid construction ofnew makeshift homes further uphill in Balfate

Below: 2010 Project Leader Blair Goldstein works

with engineer Ryan Payne to map out the systemwhich delivers chlorinated water to households

from the holding tanks seen behind them

Clnica Esperanza provides vital medical

services like neo-natal care and prescription

medications to low-income residents o Roatn


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hobbies. The Honduran students were thrilled toreceive them. The coordinators hope to eventually

incorporate photos and Skype conversations into the

program.

Students studying under the

temporary tarp classroom

Having spent some time abroad in South America,

Ms. Maye fully embraced the opportunity to offer herstudents contact with a community in a Spanish-

speaking country. While the team members are

uncertain about the speed of postal services for future

communications, just delivering one batch of letters

between the two groups felt like progress.

Due to space and staffing issues, the current schooling

situation in Roatn is bleak. Students in La Colonia

are currently learning in an inadequate temporary

facility due to an earthquake that rendered the formerschool building uninhabitable. This makeshift

structure simply does not have the capacity for

providing regular Monday through Friday instructionfor all students. Fortunately, construction of a new

permanent school is supposed to be underway

Through continued work with the community, ProjectHonduras hopes to expand the pen pal program, andalso develop education programs regarding gender

issues, sanitation, and water purification.

-Rose Tutera, MPP 12

Cross-Continental Pen Pals: Education through Communication

Since its inception, Project Honduras has prioritizededucation outreach as a main component of its work

in Roatn. Each year, the education project takes

shape based on the needs of the community and thespecific talents of the GPPI team. In the past, this has

included facilitating the building of a second story on

the communitys school as well as conducting

sanitation lessons and computer classes.

This past year (2010-2011), team members MichaelKurdyla and Rose Tutera spearheaded a project that

the group had wanted to get up and running for years:

a pen pal program between Roatn schoolchildren

and students at a KIPP School in Washington, DC.The program, still in its first stages, aims to connectstudents from across the world, offering the

opportunity not only for language training, but alsofor character building. In particular, one of the long-

term objectives for Aleisha Maye, a Spanish teacher

at the Northeast KIPP school working with Kurdyla

and Tutera (a former educator), is that the programwill open childrens eyes to cultures and communities

beyond their own. Like the children in Roatn, many

of the DC students also live in poverty; however, that

poverty has a very different face.

Project Honduras members are introduced tostudents at a primary school in La Colonia

In March 2011, Michael and Rose traveled to Roatn

equipped with roughly 30 letters from the KIPPDC

students. The letters, written in rudimentary Spanish,included topics such as family life, classes and


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Project Honduras

Georgetown Public Policy InstituteOld North, 2nd Floor

37th and O Streets NW

Washington, DC 20057

Project Honduras is funded through generous donations from people like you who believe we can make a difference. To donate, pleasemake checks payable to Georgetown University and write Project Honduras in the memo line. All donations are tax deductible.

Donate

Safe Water: Creating a Sustainable Intervention

The quality, quantity and coverage of water services inHonduras is a problem that receives international aid andattention. Unfortunately, many of these projects havefocused solely on the capital city Tegucigalpa and other

mainland municipalities in Honduras. A 2003government reform decentralized water services to themunicipal level, giving local communities the right toown, operate and control their own drinking water andwastewater systems. The community of Balfate is anexample of one such community. Its water system ismanaged by a community-driven Water BoardCommittee. This committee is separate from, thoughaccountable to, Balfates community council, thePatronatos. Their vision is to have the best community-owned water system on the island, and it is part ofProject Honduras mission to help them.

In 2010, Project Honduras, with the assistance ofengineers Chris Mattingly and Ryan Payne, performed awater assessment for the town of La Colonia Balfate.The project followed up in March 2011 with acommunity-wide household survey and data collectionexercise on access to water services and water householdstorage practices. Balfates community system currentlydelivers water to households between every three andeight days, with 80 percent receiving water either everyfour or five days. Poor storage practices at the householdlevel result in fecal contamination. 20 percent of

households are using this water for drinking purposes.All households use this water for bathing. The localhealth clinic informed GPPI Project Honduras thatgastrointestinal diseases and skin infections were themost prevalent causes for Balfate residents to seekmedical care. Our survey recorded illness in 18% ofhouseholds in the week prior to our visit, and in 35% ofhouseholds over the course of the previous month.Gastrointestinal disease accounted for 58.8% of sicknessand was the leading cause of illness in the community,followed by cold or flu and skin infections (8.8%).

Participants in pilot projectinstalling their new filters

Using the results of the technical water system assessmentalong with the evaluation of household water usepractices, Project Honduras devised a two-prongedstrategy for intermediary storage practice improvementand long-term capital investments. This strategy wassubmitted to the Environmental Resources Management(ERM) Foundation for review, and a grant was awardedfor $13,573 to complete implementation. The ERMfoundation supports environmental projects around the

world with the provision of grants and technical expertise.It is with this support that in November of 2011, theproject returned to Balfate to scale up this pilot householdfilter program to 30 families, targeting those withoutaccess to chlorinated or bottled water first. Within twoyears, GPPI Project Honduras aims to have deliveredwater filters to every household in the community andsecured the additional capital improvements necessary tomake sure that each household receives chlorinated wateron a more regular basis.

- Louise Ashton and Cynthia Brenner, MPP 12

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PH Newsletter 2011