TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Thoughts on donations to island residents

I have been asked by a board member to make a statement here with regard to fundraising for those in need on SXM, as a result of Covid 19. After Irma, it became apparent that, that there were many people who tried to help those in need. The majority of them were honest and well-meaning and the money went where it was supposed to go. However, there were some who either sought to establish Go Fund Me accounts or other methods of fundraising for THEMSELVES or otherwise didn’t have the ability to do something that they had no experience doing, and results were less outstanding.
The need as a result of the current Covid 19 situation, if anything, is more than following Irma and will be for a longer term, in many situations, especially since many who are in need now have never fully recovered from Irma. Most of us here are true lovers of SXM and her PEOPLE are what has brought many of us back, over many years, in addition to all her other charms. We hurt for her people, as well as all of those here at home who are suffering from this situation. It’s only appropriate that we should want to help out those in need and I encourage you to do that, if your finances will allow. But when you do give, PLEASE be careful and give only to organizations that can be trusted to handle the gifts appropriately.

We refused to allow those fundraising posts to be made after a while post Irma, because of the above issues. We are not in the business of vetting charitable organizations and the purpose of this post is NOT to endorse any particular organization or group or to have members compile a list of those they feel are trustworthy. Please DO NOT respond to this message to suggest appropriate places to donate. If you donated post Irma to some organization or group and feel your gift was handled appropriately, reach out to them again and see what they might be doing to help now. Or contact trusted island friends to get THEIR recommendations for how you might best help out. I have been in touch with board members Bill and Elaine and Ritchard and they have made some recommendations for organizations that they feel are trustworthy. If you need a recommendation, please contact one or the other of them by private message.

Some in the past have mentioned having us here at TTOL raise funds for SXM. That is NOT what we do and we are not set up at all to manage such an endeavor. We are especially unable to do that at THIS time because, as you know, we are supported solely by local businesses. Those same local businesses have zero income at this time, and thus we here at TTOL have no income, yet our expenses go on.

We all know that we would all love to be able to return NOW to SXM and spend some money to help the island economy. That won’t be possible, at least for the short term. But perhaps we can make some contributions in another way to local residents, until we can return.

Thank you Carol

Thanks from me too.

Thanks .

I just have to say I don't think there are any stronger people in the world than the people of St. Maarten. To suffer the blow that Irma dealt and then have this happen and the world tourism just shuts down. The effect this has on their economy is huge. I just can't imagine how families who jobs rely on all the tourist get by day to day. Hopefully we get through this quick and come out stronger than before.

We'll be back to St. Martin sometime during the first quarter of 2021. And, we'll take care the people there as we did after hurricanes like Lenny and Irma. But, at the present time we have many, many local residents struggling in our own communities that need our assistance, too. By no means at the same poverty level as on St. Maarten, but people with families to care for, mortgages and rents to pay, and the trials faced by those who were living from paycheck to paycheck. Many of us on this board are fortunate not to be in that situation. Here's one thing to consider the next time you are shopping for groceries ... if you are behind a young family and you sense they could use a helping hand financially it's okay to step in (keeping the correct social distancing!) and pay for their order (unless its something like 200 or more items!). A few years back I was behind a mom and several little ones at a local supermarket and she was digging furiously through her purse for whatever coins she could muster to pay for their order. It wasn't anything astronomical (like $33.00) so I handed the clerk a pair of twenty dollar bills and said "let me take care of this for you." The look of relief she gave me with a big "thank you" really made by day. Plan to do this again someday when on SXM at a Super U or Carrefour market!

Sammy--Great post. Thanks.

I very much like this approach, Sammy. It cuts out the "middle-man" from charitable giving. Often a good thing.

Agree with this completely. All we can do via this great forum is favor/disfavor disproportionately.

SXMers are smart and can and do help themselves. As Usual. They have local and far away govt help.


Worldwide, we have to channel our best thinking, hopes, prayers, energy, political pressure, money, industry and government into development and mass production of cost effective, large scale, ubiquitous testing, remedies, and cures.

May it all come very quickly, the motivation is there.

Just want to add a personal thank you, Carol, for this post and to Elaine Miller, too, for pointing me in the right direction to some well respected island charities. I had some difficulty with one of the websites in trying to make the donation but I sent them an email and they responded almost immediately, and I was able to do so.

The really nice part of doing this was the follow-up email I received from one of the organizations the next day thanking me and telling me how much they appreciated the donation. I had already gotten PayPal notifications from both organizations I had donated to and was expecting nothing further so the personal thank you was special.

All good intentions.

Well put, Carol. We agree!
Thanks.

Contessa

Contessa, we miss the Friday funnies and all your good insight!