Bringing Unity to Community During Disaster

Lighthouse Charity Team in Action

Hurricane Harvey roared ashore battering the small coastal town of Rockport, Texas. It then quickly made its way to Houston bringing record-breaking torrential rainfall causing one of the worst flooding events in Houston’s history.

 

This story begins with Sheriff’s Deputy John Bertolino Sr., a Galveston County first responder. He was delivering a wet, bedraggled group of flood victims to a local church shelter when it hit him in the gut. He was hungry! It had been 10 hours since he had last eaten and the situation was only getting worse. That’s when he made the call to Scott Gordon of the Lighthouse Charity Team.

Scott’s phone rang at 10 p.m. “Scott, this is John. The creeks and rivers are rapidly overflowing and flooding people’s homes. Thousands are stranded and need to be rescued. I’ve been out for hours with every available first responder transporting families from their flooded homes to makeshift shelters. I haven’t eaten in over 10 hours and neither have the other first responders. Stores are closed, roads are flooded; there’s no food to be had anywhere. Can you help?”

Without hesitation, Scott replied, “Yes, sir!”

(Scott presides over one of Texas Gulf Coast’s most respected and recognized volunteer groups, the Lighthouse Charity Team. Their mission, “Cooking for a Cause” provides hot meals for first responders during times of disaster. They are experienced at feeding thousands of people with little notice under stressful conditions.)

As Scott hung up the phone, he immediately put out an “all hands on deck” message to his team. “Get to the operations centers as safely as you can. Fire up the kitchens, make sure the back up electrical generators are working and our big trucks are fueled and ready to deliver food to first responders and flood victims”. 

(From past experience, the founders of the LCT, Dick and Horacene Daugird, knew that hurricanes always cause flooding. In anticipation, they personally purchased oversized surplus military vehicles kept at the Lighthouse Charity Team’s (LCT) Operation Centers in Friendswood and Galveston. Most of the time these vehicles are used for parades and static display to honor the military, but these large vehicles are designed to traverse flooded roads, creeks and bayous enabling them to deliver food and supplies to stranded victims.)

Officer Bertolino knew his call for help would be answered.  As a fellow Lighthouse Charity Team volunteer, he was confident he could count on his team.

His trust was well founded. The volunteers showed up in all manner of vehicles; boats, large trucks and some even waded in from nearby homes through streets too flooded to drive through. Little did John know that his call would eventually yield an effort that would span over 4000 man-hours, and produce over 15000 hot meals to both rescuers and victims.

In the midst of the ongoing effort, Lighthouse Charities surplus food supplies dwindled. Scott called his friend Matt Resnick, the manager of the local Sam’s Club and a resident of Friendswood. “Matt, he said, our request for food has increased from 50 to 1500 meals a day and we are running out of supplies. I know Sam’s Warehouse is closed, but can you do anything?”  Matt responded, “If you can get your trucks here, I’ll open the store and you can take what you need”. (A big thanks to Sam’s Club.) With replenished food supplies, the exhausted volunteers found new energy and were able to continue cooking and delivering hot meals.

Additionally, some of the team also became first responders using their own personal boats to rescue over 300 flood victims. The Lighthouse Galveston Operations Center, in addition to the hundreds of the daily hot meals prepared, became a drop off point for people who donated food, clothes, cleaning supplies and baby items, the most coveted being diapers. Thousands of items, were sorted, packaged and delivered to the local relief centers over the next three weeks.

And so it went for days on end. As Houston experienced an unprecedented deluge of 27 trillion gallons of water, this incredible team put in over 4000 man-hours, and people noticed. Much-needed donations came pouring in from around the country both through LCT’s website and in person.

As the recovery continues, the Lighthouse Charity Team is asking, “What else can we do?” On Thanksgiving Day, knowing many residents are still without kitchens, this selfless group of volunteers will continue bringing “Unity to Community” by cooking and serving 20,000 Thanksgiving dinners with all the trimmings to Galveston area residents seeking to rebuild their lives and make Harvey a distant memory.

To learn more about the Lighthouse Charity Team go to www.lighthousecharityteam.com

Lorraine Grubbs is an author, speaker and business consultant who specializes in team building and creating Happy Workplaces.  To learn more? Go to:

www.lorrainegrubbs.com