Sails for Sustenance 2008

 

Just a reminder that Fleet 50 will be collecting old sails at the Potomac Cup to send to the Sails for Sustenance Program in Miami. Please refer to the Fleet 50 web page for further details about this program. Anyone who is traveling outside of the DC metropolitan area is welcome to bring sails to the regatta.  Because of transport issues I ask that Fleet 50 members who wish to donate do so at the marina during the May/early June due to logistics of transporting the sails to Leeslyvania and then back to DC.   

 

I would appreciate if out of town skippers wishing to donate send me an email indicating how many sails you will be bringing so I can plan transport and storage.  We will have a form available at registration to fill out to document your contribution which will accompany the shipment. You will then receive a letter from the SFS Program which you can use for tax purposes. I will arrange to collect the sails on Sunday.

More Information about the program
Fleet 50 is pleased to partner with the Sails for Sustenance Program (SFS) in Miami, Florida.  SFS is dedicated to recycling sails donated in the US by providing them to subsistence fishermen of Haiti.  This is an impressive non-profit corporation co-founded by Michael Carcaise and Michael Laas, both of whom are sailors.  Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and is growing poorer each year.  Three out of 4 employable Haitians don't have jobs, education is almost nonexistent and most people live on less than US $2 a day.  According to the World Bank, global food prices are up 80% over the last three years.  After the recent riots the Haitian government decreased the price for a sack of rice from US $51 to US $43. But in the marketplace a small container of rice has recently risen from 40 cents to 80 cents, almost one half of the average daily income. 

Fishing boats are hand made locally and sails are often constructed from scraps of material, plastic bags, and used rice bags. By providing sails of better material local fisherman stay safer when at sea in their boats and are able to reach faster speeds enabling them to trawl for more species of fish.   Fleet 50 is collecting used sails to send to the SFS program.  Out of town skippers sailing in the Potomac Cup and wanting to contribute can bring your used sails to the regatta.  If you live locally I can collect them at the Washington Sailing Marina.  Sails don't have to be in great shape and can have tears or holes as many are sewn into new sails.  Your donation is tax deductible.  If you don't have sails to donate there are other ways to help, such as helping with the sail collection, preparing sails for transport, providing space in a garage or basement for storage prior to shipment, donating to shipment costs or helping to transport sails to the temporary storage sites.


SFS has a great website www.sailsforsustenance.org with an impressive YouTube video of boats using donated sails.

It is a small, almost insignificant thing to contribute an old sail, but each small act of kindness will enable a Haitian fisherman to feed his family.

 
Laurie Duncan (leduncan@earthlink.net
14187
202 546 5454 home
202 302 7971 cell