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metro >> on the cover

After mnt.

Flood

Gratitude and perspective are common
feelings among those hit hardest.

Stacy Gittleman I Contributing Writer

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

In her home, the basement is restored
with new drywall, paint and carpeting.
Mechnikov was thankful to have taken
out a sewage backup rider on the family's
home insurance policy, which helped pay
for the damage. Their hot water heater is
hanging on, and the big screen television
in the basement was saved because it was
placed on a high shelf. There is no longer
a comfortable couch on which to watch it,
but replacing it is not a high priority for the
family now
Throughout the neighborhoods in Oak
Park and Huntington Woods, this senti-
ment of putting things in perspective dur-
ing the Thanksgiving season repeats itself.
Belongings, even as precious as journals
kept over a lifetime or sacred prayer books,
are just material possessions. Most resi-
dents express gratefulness that few lives
were lost or injuries occurred because of
the rising waters.

Help Was There
Many express their gratitude for the strong
showing of coordinated financial and emo-
tional support provided by local and out-
of-town Jewish agencies.
Shaindle Braunstein, chief administrative
officer of Jewish Family Service in West
Bloomfield, said in the weeks following the
mid-August floods, the agency received
hundreds of calls and assisted 309 families
victimized by the flood — 253 of which
had never before contacted JFS for help.
According to Braunstein, JFS distributed
$700,000 in grants to families who needed
to clean and remediate their basements
and replace furnaces and appliances, and
also emotional support in helping over-
whelmed families — sometimes with 10 or
more members — sift through the paper-
work they needed to file with FEMA or
insurance agencies.
Art Van Furniture also played a role in
donating furniture.
Kathy Moran of Detroit's Focus:Hope,
the organization responsible for coordi-
nating the company's donated furniture
distribution across multiple relief agencies,
such as JFS and the American Red Cross,
said the company donated 300 sofas, 225
dressers, 100 carpets and 150 mattresses to

Aaron Geller

Menashe, Yehuda and Sruli
Goldstein of Oak Park relax in
one of the renovated bedrooms
in their family's basement,
which had been badly damaged
by flood waters.

deserving households.
She said Art Van Furniture "went above
and beyond" in its generosity when it
additionally donated 150 bookshelves for
children's basement bedrooms so children
could once again rebuild their home librar-
ies.
JFS was thankful not only for its exist-
ing local infrastructure, but also for
the added efforts of out-of-town Jewish
agencies such as NECHAMA, based in
Minneapolis, Minn., which had boots on
the ground through October and cleaned
250 houses; and IsraAID: The Israel Forum
for International Humanitarian Aid.
"Because of our everyday, business-

as-usual infrastructure and coordination
with partnering agencies such as the JCC
in Oak Park and the Jewish Federation
of Metropolitan Detroit, families knew
how and when to reach us when the
floods made the situation far from busi-
ness as usual:' said Daniel Trudeau of JFS.
"Grassroots organizations like Chessed,
NECHAMA and IsraAID were instrumen-
tal in reaching those most heavily affected
to get the word out of how to get help:"
Braunstein said the grassroots organiza-
tion Chessed was an "invaluable" partner
in reaching out to the Orthodox commu-
nity in Oak Park and identifying needs.
Many have large families who use their
basements as prime living and sleeping
quarters. Not only did they help in the
distribution of furniture donations from
Art Van, but also in coordinating donations
of household goods from as far away as
Cleveland and Chicago.
Hebrew Free Loan also offered assis-
tance by approving a total of $290,000
in loans, according to executive director
David Contorer. He said his agency did

everything possible to expedite 43 loans for
families in need of basement restorations
and new furnaces and hot water heaters.
"We sped up our approval process by 50
percent:' Contorer said. "We knew there
was an urgency to clean out basements
because it was an immediate health issue,
and getting these no-strings-attached dol-
lars to clients was very important:'

Families Coped
One family that benefitted from JFS servic-
es was the Goldsteins of Oak Park. Channie
and Yitz Goldstein have eight children, and
they both work. They were not receiving
assistance of any kind from JFS before the
flood. Three children have bedrooms in the
basement. Yitz, a computer analyst, also
uses the basement as office space.
Channie Goldstein, a teacher, expressed
gratitude that when the floods started, it
was during the day and no children were
asleep in the basement. In fact, she said all
her teen-age boys were home at the time
and when the basement began to flood,
they acted quickly to retrieve as much as

Flood on page 10

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December 4 • 2014

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