Long-term Resilience Building in Dominica

On 18 September 2018, Hurricane Maria hit the independent island of Dominica, as a category 5 storm with winds of up to 160 mph, the second major hurricane to hit the region in just a few weeks. As a result of the storm, 90% of buildings lost their roofs, leaving roads and businesses devastated.

With over 30 fatalities and the island’s entire infrastructure – homes, agriculture, electricity and water supplies – destroyed, IsraAID arrived to conduct initial assessments and deliver much needed relief goods including hygiene kits, water filters, generators as well as vital medical and psychological support. Almost a year and a half after Hurricane Maria, Dominica remains seriously impacted. Although the situation is normalizing, the remote communities of the South East side of Dominica are still struggling to maintain their routine.

In partnership with The Church of Latter-Day Saints, Digicel, the United Nations Development Programme, and the Miami Foundation, IsraAID has repaired the roofs of 109 vulnerable families in the South Eastern part of Dominica, including homes of some of the indigenous population, the Kalinago community.

The Kalinago community is one of the most disproportionately underserved, vulnerable populations on the island. This indigenous community is made up of some 3,000 people, who live in their own territory, considered a reservation, on the eastern side of the island. This ethnic community remains highly impacted by Hurricane Maria. High levels of poverty, and low infrastructural resilience continues to plague the community and creates a major obstacle toward rebuilding and recovering.

The Kaligango reservation is based on a legal system in which individuals don’t own their own land. This creates a challenging dynamic for supporting shelter and roof repairs. Furthermore, in order to maintain the cultural integrity inherent to the Kalinago tradition, special measures must be taken into account to provide support for the local architecture, culture, and customs. Amid these difficulties, IsraAID built relationships within the Kalinago community, hiring local Kalinago staff to lead building projects within their own community, consistent with traditional architecture, in partnership with our other Dominican staff members.

The overarching project aimed to reroof homes of children attending schools in the Concord, Atkinson, Salybia, Sineku, Castle-Bruce and La-Plaine communities—Salybia and Sineku are both in the Kalinago region. The schools in these communities were used in the immediate aftermath as shelters for families whose homes were destroyed, and as such, were not available to be used at schools. It was important that students attending school in these communities were able to return home to a safe, resilient house, and that schools could be reopened.

IsraAID designed a beneficiary household survey in order to identify the most vulnerable beneficiaries, with a unique 3 category matrix. Beneficiaries were categorized according to their socio-economic status, the physical strength of the house that remains, and the level of damage to the house. Of the 309 households surveyed, 145 were found relevant for re-roofing and 109 were completely re-roofed. Since, during the rehabilitation period there was much displacement and families hosting other families, it is complicated to total the exact number of direct beneficiaries, however, following our team’s extensive surveys, we estimate it at between 800 to 1,000.

Check out the before and after photos!

Thank you for your support of this important program!