Using CA to plan ongoing relief and a continuum to rebuilding

Dear Colleagues

There is a huge amount of energy in the Haitian diaspora ... and there are 9 million Haitians that should be a central part of the relief and rebuilding process. But is this the plan that will emerge from the planning process of the Government of Haiti together with the UN, World Bank, bilateral donors, NGOs and all the other entities that operate in the relief and development industry?

If history is any indicator, probably not. But success and sustainable progress requires that the people of Haiti are engaged in the process, and while there are legitimate needs for the government to mobilize resources to repair and rebuild a lot of infrastructure, it needs to be done in ways that serve to build the local economy.

A process of rebuilding that engages the population of Haiti at the community level all over the country could be transformative ... and should be transformative. Accordingly the CA methodology is being used to develop a supplement to the official plan so that there is a framework to guide development resources to the community level so that there may be progress at this level. Furthermore, the CA methodology calls for the plan to be based on critical data about the state of the community, and for the progress of the community to be measured as times goes by. The CA metrics are, of course, not only about money, they are also about all the various aspects of community value.

The CA supplementary plan takes every community in Haiti and asks the simple questions: (1) What is? (2) What can it be in the future? (3) What is missing? (4) How to overcome the obstacles?

This supplementary plan will be dynamic and change as more information becomes available. The framework of the plan merely guides resources to assist in areas where there is a need.

Data acquisition is from many sources ... data already in some electronic form ... data sent in by email to peterbnyc@gmail.com with "Haiti CA Plan" in the subject line ... and stay tuned for a text message input process along the lines of the Ushahidi method.

The immediate goal is to have the Haiti Supplementary Plan available for use prior to the March 31st launching at the UN of the official GoH plan so that donors and others may be able to consider its merits in the context of the official plan.

Further information about this initiative will be posted as the work progresses.

Peter Burgess
Community Analytics (CA)