Great news for the people of Port-au-Prince.
Thanks to all the hard work of actor Sean Penn and J/P Haitian Relief Organization according to online reports, for the first time in four years, the nearly 60,000 people who sought refuge on the Petionville Club golf course after the earthquake in Haiti are now under solid roofs in safer homes.
NewsWeek reports,
The rains have come to the Caribbean and hurricane season is upon us. Butfor the first time in four years, the nearly 60,000 people who sought refuge on the Petionville Club golf course after the earthquake in Haiti are now under solid roofs in safer homes.
The J/P Haitian Relief Organization continues to support these families as they rebuild resilient, sustainable and self-sufficient communities. Elsewhere in Haiti, Doctors Without Borders has brought health care to the most remote areas of the country, and the Haitian government has developed new building codes as part of a national housing policy.
Port-au-Prince, the capital city, has made remarkable progress. Nearly all of the 10 million cubic meters of rubble that buried the city has been cleared from the streets. More than 90 percent of the almost 2 million people left homeless have moved from tent camps to more permanent housing.
Haiti’s economy is among the fastest-growing in the Caribbean, as the government continues to make economic development a priority. Hundreds of kilometers of roads are now paved, thousands of homes built and tens of thousands of damaged homes repaired or retrofitted. Crime rates have dropped, and in May 2011, one political party transferred power to another peacefully after an election for the first time in modern history.
The people of Haiti have come a long way, which may shock those who watch the news. Headlines continue to spin Haiti as a dark, poverty-entrenched no man’s land. Even on the left, efforts at economic development have been portrayed as colonization by corporations or occupation by a foreign force. Continue Reading Here
