There is a balm in Gilead according to the Bible. Since the Valley Fire there’s also been a balm in Middletown.
Middletown Bible Church has been a strong community leader for relief, healing and recovery from the fire’s destruction. Soon after the fire was finally extinguished, motorists driving through town could observe a large bright banner which read, “Hope City.” That’s the name for a camp of volunteers, hosted by Middletown Bible Church. These volunteers will be major players as new homes are rebuilt where ashes and charred foliage presently lay.
They are led by Kevin Cox,CEO and founder of Hope Crisis Response Network(HCRN),a non-profit missionary group from Indiana here to rebuild and then give homes to the most needy of the fire victims. Cox was instrumental in the formation of the long term recovery group Team Lake County (TLC), which will coordinate the collaboration of all the community agencies dedicated to the recovery effort. Although TLC is still in the planning stages for the long term recovery, Cox is busy building an HCRN model home at the Middletown Rancheria for a family of evacuees from the Valley Fire.
Several months ago Twin Pines Casino manager Justin Lord, his wife Courtney and their infant daughter Emelia escaped from their rental on Hwy 175,from the nightmare of the Valley Fire. Now this new model home is being built in the Rancheria for them.
“I even get to help,” Courtney Lord, a 2007 graduate of Middletown High School, said happily. “I helped lift the walls into place. And Justin has been the one to cut the boards to size.”
Her husband is working as an apprentice carpenter under foreman Monte Brenneman, an HCRN volunteer from Birmingham, Alabama.
All of the local Pomo tribes as well as other Native American tribes throughout California and the United States have rallied together to pay for the costs of rebuilding homes for tribal members who lost everything in the Valley Fire.
“We’ll be in a home soon,” Courtney Lord declared. “As soon as we saw the foundation go in, we took a breath. We saw that we’ll have our own place. Living in a hotel has been stressful. I’m mostly excited to soon have a kitchen again.”
“Yeah,” Justin Lord added. “A home cooked meal will be a real treat.”
TLC’s goal is to help those who still have unmet needs after the government has done all it can for them. Like a balm used as a remedy for wounds, TLC hopes to restore as many people as possible — uninsured or under insured homeowners, as well as renters — back into their neighborhoods in the comfort of their own homes. Two other home builders collaborating with TLC are Habitat For Humanity and Mennonites Disaster Service.
