Monday, April 17. 2006
Three Dozen Volunteers Clean-up Tornado Debris in Iowa City
On Thursday evening, April 14, 2006, severe storms ripped through eastern Iowa and spawned tornadoes that crushed homes, cars, and killed one person. The National Weather Service reported tornadoes in Tama, Linn, Muscatine, and Johnson counties, with much of the damage occurring in Iowa City, home of the University of Iowa.
Less than 24 hours later, Nechama: Jewish Response to Disaster arrived in Iowa City to help the local residents clean-up scattered shingles, siding, and downed trees. First on the scene was our deployment manager, Ken Streiff. He evaluated the damage and recommended that we send volunteers and one of our three tool trailers down as quickly as possible.
Key volunteer and former board member Gene Borochoff arrived Saturday evening, as did board member Todd Cytron and his 11 year old daughter, Hannah. Board member Steven Rothberg and his 11 year old son, Isaac, arrived Sunday morning. Most of the damage occurred in a one block area that includes the Agudas Achim Congregation synagogue.
While many would expect Nechama to automatically clean-up damage first at synagogues and other property owned by Jews, that has actually not been our practice. When we arrive at the site of a disaster such as in Iowa City, we do not ask who you are. Instead, we ask how can we help. So in Iowa City we surveyed the damage and determined that a number of homes were severely damaged and we knew that we could help, but the owners of the homes were either management companies and not available or they were private homeowners and in church to celebrate Easter. As a result, we started our efforts at the synagogue.
Prior to our arrival, Rabbi Jeffrey Portman and his staff put out a call for volunteers by notifying the congregants and other residents that Nechama would be cleaning up in the area starting Sunday morning. The call was extremely well received as three dozen volunteers arrived early Sunday morning and within a few hours had completed virtually all of the clean-up work at the syngagogue. By noon, the only debris remaining were trees trunks in a creek behind the synagogue. Those will need to be removed by cranes.
At noon, the University of Iowa Hillel graciously served a hot, Kosher-for-Passover meal to the volunteers. Steven and Todd gave a short talk about the history and mission of Nechama, and then it was back to work.
Shortly after lunch, Ken returned to Minneapolis at the insistence of Gene, Todd, and Steven so that Ken could enjoy Easter supper with his family. The word meatballs kept coming up. Hopefully they saved some for him.
Gene continued to work on a tree beside the synagogue's property while Todd and Steven took a team across the street to a public park to help clean-up there.
After about an hour, the owner of a damaged home next to the synagogue returned home and accepted our offer to help. We immediately set to work chainsawing several large trees that were down in his backyard. When we started, you could hardly see that he had a backyard. It had been all downed tree trunks andbranches. When we were forced to stop because of approaching lightning, we had cleared about half of his backyard.
The people of Iowa City were gracious, grateful, and generous and we look forward to building our relationship with them.
Less than 24 hours later, Nechama: Jewish Response to Disaster arrived in Iowa City to help the local residents clean-up scattered shingles, siding, and downed trees. First on the scene was our deployment manager, Ken Streiff. He evaluated the damage and recommended that we send volunteers and one of our three tool trailers down as quickly as possible.Key volunteer and former board member Gene Borochoff arrived Saturday evening, as did board member Todd Cytron and his 11 year old daughter, Hannah. Board member Steven Rothberg and his 11 year old son, Isaac, arrived Sunday morning. Most of the damage occurred in a one block area that includes the Agudas Achim Congregation synagogue.
While many would expect Nechama to automatically clean-up damage first at synagogues and other property owned by Jews, that has actually not been our practice. When we arrive at the site of a disaster such as in Iowa City, we do not ask who you are. Instead, we ask how can we help. So in Iowa City we surveyed the damage and determined that a number of homes were severely damaged and we knew that we could help, but the owners of the homes were either management companies and not available or they were private homeowners and in church to celebrate Easter. As a result, we started our efforts at the synagogue.
Prior to our arrival, Rabbi Jeffrey Portman and his staff put out a call for volunteers by notifying the congregants and other residents that Nechama would be cleaning up in the area starting Sunday morning. The call was extremely well received as three dozen volunteers arrived early Sunday morning and within a few hours had completed virtually all of the clean-up work at the syngagogue. By noon, the only debris remaining were trees trunks in a creek behind the synagogue. Those will need to be removed by cranes.At noon, the University of Iowa Hillel graciously served a hot, Kosher-for-Passover meal to the volunteers. Steven and Todd gave a short talk about the history and mission of Nechama, and then it was back to work.
Shortly after lunch, Ken returned to Minneapolis at the insistence of Gene, Todd, and Steven so that Ken could enjoy Easter supper with his family. The word meatballs kept coming up. Hopefully they saved some for him.
Gene continued to work on a tree beside the synagogue's property while Todd and Steven took a team across the street to a public park to help clean-up there.
After about an hour, the owner of a damaged home next to the synagogue returned home and accepted our offer to help. We immediately set to work chainsawing several large trees that were down in his backyard. When we started, you could hardly see that he had a backyard. It had been all downed tree trunks andbranches. When we were forced to stop because of approaching lightning, we had cleared about half of his backyard.The people of Iowa City were gracious, grateful, and generous and we look forward to building our relationship with them.
