Project CO #1: T-36 hours

In 36 hours, I’ll be en route to Colorado for two weeks of disaster recovery work in Lyons and Longmont, two cities hit hard by last year’s flooding.

Flood Event:

In mid-September of last year, heavy rains pummeled Colorado’s Front Range for almost a week, falling especially hard in the area ranging from Boulder to Greeley. The result: catastrophic flooding across 200 miles.

Eight people died as a result of the flooding, an estimated 20,000 homes were damaged – close to 2,000 of which were totally destroyed and Colorado declared a disaster emergency in 17 counties.

Thank You:

A heartfelt thank you to friends, family, and colleagues who’ve supported my travels to provide relief efforts and help communities rebuild after a natural disaster. I could not do this work without your donations, moral support, and help with logistics.

Thank you Knothe and Bruce Architects for covering my responsibilities, allowing me the time off for this CO work trip. This work is important, not just in that we can help communities rebuild, but so that we can learn from them. As the AIA WI State Disaster Assistance Coordinator, I hope to gain a better understanding of how architects can help respond to a flood situation in Wisconsin.

Each volunteer is asked to raise $500 to cover job site materials and general supplies. I’ve set up a personal fundraising page at ALL HANDS VOLUNTEERS. A sincere thank you to those who have contributed as your money is going directly into the CO efforts where I’ll be working.

A little more on our work in CO:

In June of this year, All Hands Volunteers launched Project Colorado: Recovery & Rebuild. Working with our partner, Habitat for Humanity of the St. Vrain Valley. Thanks to the generous support of many, we have completed repairs or rebuild on 6 homes, are currently working on another 5 homes, and have 3 major projects in the pipeline, including one home that is being rebuilt from the foundation up.