About La Piedra
LA PIEDRA—History & our most urgent needs
Some of the oldest residents remember life in La Piedra ( “The Rock”) in the 1940s, when all the Ingenio San Luis sugar and the undeveloped lands around them just were a small part of the vast estates of “El Presidente” - Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, a fierce dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from 1930-1961. After Trujillo´s assassination in May of 1961 the Dominican government laid claim to all the surrounding land and promptly sold thousands of square meters of it to a U.S. company called Torre B (concrete facts about this company are not available at this time). Torre B sent in bulldozers to carve out roads, but when the company´s VIPs arrived to drive around their new properties, they were aghast—the region is dominated by karst topography. The land is composed of highly soluble, very jagged rock, mostly limestone. It is the furthest from agricultural land that most people can imagine, though what the don´t know is that the dirt that has collected in holes among the jagged rock formations is highly fertile. La Piedra is also a very dry region. The company abandoned whatever project it had in mind for La Piedra, and a few people who lived nearby like from Toro de Baní and Guerra moved in to take over—the biggest business of the time was cutting down and burning the local trees to make charcoal, although some farmed the rocky land. Still large stretches of it, remained abandoned.
The majority of La Piedra’s current residents began to arrive after strong winds and floodings caused by Hurricane Georges (1998) and Hurricane Olga (2007) washed away their homes and all their meager belongings. These families had built makeshift homes, mostly made of cardboard and discarded pieces of tin, and without plumbing, along the flood plains of the Ozama River in the city of Santo Domingo. The CEA (the State Sugar Council branch) was founded to manage a program to provide small plots of land to these marginalized and families of mixed Dominican and Haitian ancestry. They have now built homes in La Piedra, where there is no threat of flooding from hurricanes, but where water, plumbing, electricity, and other services are either unavailable or only from costly or far away sources. Residents have formed community organisations to try to convince the government to bring these services to La Piedra, but there is no guarantee that this will ever happen.
The community of La Piedra, with a total population of approximately 5,000 inhabitants, is divided into three sectors. Our Community Center is located in La Piedra 1, where we currently offer educational programs: The new school program (Escuela Bilingue Dra. Lynne Guitar), the after school program for 200 kids, the food program for 200 people a day, from Monday to Friday, My Roof program, where more than 100 families´ houses are being fixed and rebuilt, and the basic health-care services to 1,300+ patients from both La Piedra 1 and La Piedra 2.
The residents of La Piedra live in extreme poverty. Around 60% earn less than US$3 per day for lack of employment and 1 in 3 earns less than US$2 per day—if they are lucky enough to earn anything!—which drives us to helping them. These people survive by raising animals, principally chickens, growing some food for local consumption, such as yuca and other vegetables, and by doing occasional odd jobs (chiriperu). A few of the residents buy potable water, but it is only available in 5-gallon bottles that cost US$1 each. Only 10% of the residents have access to electricity, and there are no phone lines, internet, or other types of technology available.
Guanín´s principal concern is to ensure the security and wellbeing of La Piedra´s children and youth. In addition to our educational work, we want to be able to offer a first aid and general health care center that is as comfortable and efficient as possible, and thus help more lives. We want to have a center our community can be proud of, where the people can feel that they are the protagonists in their own development and can help support both their neighbours and their country.
GENERAL CONTEXT
The Problem:
The community of La Piedra lacks health-care centers—except for our small first aid and medical dispensary, there are no first-aid centers, hospitals or clinics nearby. The nearest health-care centers are located a considerable distance away and are only accessible via rocky dirt roads that are difficult to drive on, especially when one is in a hurry. This has been the cause of many severe injuries, even deaths, because we have had to transport injured and ill residents to the hospital in trucks and on motorcycles.
Antecedents:
Using established precautions, our medical dispensary offers free medical consultations every Monday through Friday, and distributes medicine that has been donated from various sources. Those patients who require special attention are referred to the hospitals in Santo Domingo. We also provide free medical operatives and dental operatives three times a year with the help of both Dominican and international doctors, dentists, and advanced-level medical and dental students.
Justification:
The closest first aid center to La Piedra - 45 minutes away by car. The closest school, Pre K to 4th grade- 30 minutes away. Sources of steady employment - none. The roads that connect La Piedra to other communities and to the city are in a very bad condition. There is no public transportation, just the “motorcycle taxies.” Most residents walk wherever they need to go.
Needs:
1. In the last six years that we have been working with isolated communities, we have come to realize the necessity of BIGGER MEDICAL CLINICS, COMPUTER LABS WITH INTERNET AND A LIBRARY, where we can provide first aid and seeking a comfortable vehicle, adequately equipped as an AMBULANCE, ensuring a possibility to transport our patients to outlying hospitals. There is a clear risk of further injuries and even deaths if we continue to transport critically ill or injured patients to the nearest hospital via these ROCKY DIRT ROADS that are in such bad condition on the backs of motorcycles or, on occasion, in loaned vehicles that are often in poor condition as well.
2. An international SCHOOL where both Haitian and Dominican can assist without any difference of nationality and colors.
3. LABOR-VOCATIONAL SCHOOL for youth and adults to provide technical-vocational courses, such as: making candles and decorative candles, rinse and shampoo manufacturing, bakery, confectionery and others for women, residential electricity, industrial electricity and etc., in addition we propose to make small loans to enable graduates to start their own small businesses, improving their quality of life comprehensively.
4. Water Project. Construction of a water tank with 10,000 gallons of PURIFIED WATER for the community of la Piedra 1, with 1300 People.
1. Small water project with an underground pump for 150 family in la Jabilla, la Piedra.
2. Small water project with an underground pump for 220 family in la Barrio Carolina, la Piedra.
1. ENLARGE OUR CLINIC BUILDING
2. Construction of a PLAY GROUND AND RECREATIONAL PARK for the community
3. Organic AGRICULTURE project, where the community will have income and food for living. We need more institutions to become involved.
4. MY ROOF PROJECT. Build new and comfortable, small houses and finance them to the community members.
School history.
Regarding our new school name: (Colegio Bilingue Dra. Lynne Guitar), it´s trilingual school, where we teach Spanish, English and French.
That name was given in honor of our President of the Guanin Center, Dr. Lynne A. Guitar, co-founder of the Guanin Inc. and of the student agency (SAS), godmother of many and many Dominicans. She has financed their education, protected community of la Piedra and other Dominican communities.
In the last five years that we have worked with these isolated communities of poor people, we have come to realize the necessity of seeking an international school, where both Haitians and Dominicans can assist without any indifferences of nationality and colors.
Regarding the Dominican government´s new school policies, we will no longer be doing a morning program and afternoon program, instead we will be doing a normal school day going from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM. They are enforcing every school program to be conducted this way.
We feed all the children three times a day, breakfast, lunch and snack.
Lunch: 200 cooked meals are donated by the Dominican Government, every day from Monday to Friday. We have a driver who picks up the cooked meal every day, from Santo Domingo to the Community Center Guanin in la Piedra.
We started the school with 50 students, school year 2014/2015, now we have 125 students, school year 2015/2016. Additionally 1 director, 1 rector, 1 secretary, 2 accredited teachers and 7 assistants, 1 medical doctor and 2 nurses, 1 night security, 1 morning security and 2 cleaning personal, 2 kitchen personnel and 2 drivers , one who brings the food from Monday to Friday and the other one to drive the kids back and forward to their home.