 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(February 2007) |
 Plenty International | |
| Formation | 1974 |
|---|---|
| Type | Nonprofit |
| 23-7432298 | |
| Legal status | 501(c)(3) |
| Headquarters | Summertown, Tennessee |
Board Chair | Lisa Wartinger |
Executive Director | Peter Schweitzer |
| Award(s) | Right Livelihood Award |
| Website | https://plenty.org/ |
Plenty International is an environmental, humanitarian aid and human rights organization based in Summertown, Tennessee, United States.
In 1974, Stephen Gaskin and The Farm, an intentional community, started an outreach program called Plenty. In response to the devastating 1976 Guatemala earthquake, Plenty sent carpenters who built schools, houses and clinics in remote Mayan villages and a clinic for Mother Teresa. In its first ten years, Plenty established a clinic and orphanage in Bangladesh, an appropriate technology training center and reforestation program in Lesotho, and a wind-powered electric lighting system in a Carib Indian school in Dominica. It provided disaster relief in the "Developing" World and free ambulance service to the South Bronx which helped to train emergency personnel what then became New York City's EMS. It went to sea with Greenpeace and gave the Rainbow Warrior its ham radio, slo-scan TV, and radiation monitoring equipment. [1] Plenty put Native American FM stations on the air, and pioneered amateur-band television and radio to keep its remote outposts of volunteers connected.
Plenty continues to work with Native American primary health care, midwifery, microeconomics, food and ecotourism cooperatives and alternative building programs, including the hemp house on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation with the assistance of The Farm School. [2]
Following the catastrophic landfall of Hurricane Katrina near New Orleans in August 2005, Plenty volunteers worked on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis to deliver essential supplies and re-establish civil order. [3] Plenty worked with Veterans for Peace, Camp Casey, and others to place volunteers where they were most needed. Plenty stayed on scene for the following year and organized clean-up and repair of the damage along the coastlines of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, including the cities of Mobile (Alabama), Biloxi and Gulfport (Mississippi), and Slidell (Louisiana). [4] Plenty also brought displaced and disadvantaged children from the Gulf Coast back to The Farm to participate in its Kids To The Country summer nature school in 2006.
Plenty was awarded the Right Livelihood Award in 1980 for "caring, sharing and acting with and on behalf of those in need at home and abroad." [5]
Hancock County is the southernmost county of the U.S. state of Mississippi and is named for Founding Father John Hancock. As of the 2020 census, the population was 46,053. Its county seat is Bay St. Louis.
Waveland is a city located in Hancock County, Mississippi, United States, on the Gulf of Mexico. It is part of the Gulfport–Biloxi, Mississippi Metropolitan Statistical Area. The city of Waveland was incorporated in 1972. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 6,435. Waveland was nearly destroyed by Hurricane Camille on August 17, 1969, and by Hurricane Katrina on August 29, 2005.
Purvis is a U.S. city in and the county seat of Lamar County, Mississippi. It is part of the Hattiesburg, Mississippi Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 2,175 at the 2010 census. The Town of Purvis was incorporated on February 25, 1888 and was founded by and named after Thomas Melville Purves, originally of Marion County, Alabama. Purves, born March 8, 1820, was a second generation Scottish-American; his grandfather emigrated to Charleston, South Carolina in 1765.
The Farm is an intentional community in Lewis County, Tennessee, near the town of Summertown, Tennessee, based on principles of nonviolence and respect for the Earth. It was founded in 1971 by Stephen Gaskin and 300 spiritual seekers from Haight-Ashbury and San Francisco. The Farm was the setting for "the rebirth of midwifery in the United States" and the creation of "the modern home-birth movement." Its members have founded a number of nonprofit organizations, including Plenty International, a relief and development organization, and Swan Conservation Trust, who established the 1,358 acres (550 ha) Big Swan Headwaters Preserve. The Farm has approximately 200 members and residents.
Hurricane Katrina was a devastating and deadly Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that caused 1,836 fatalities and damages estimated between $97.4 billion to $145.5 billion in late August 2005, particularly in the city of New Orleans and its surrounding area. At the time, it was the costliest tropical cyclone on record, later tied by Hurricane Harvey in 2017. Katrina was the twelfth tropical cyclone, the fifth hurricane, and the third major hurricane of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season. It was also the fourth-most intense Atlantic hurricane to make landfall in the contiguous United States, gauged by barometric pressure.
The article covers the Hurricane Katrina effects by region, within the United States and Canada. The effects of Hurricane Katrina, in late August 2005, were catastrophic and widespread. It was one of the deadliest natural disasters in U.S. history, leaving at least 1,836 people dead, and a further 135 missing. The storm was large and had an effect on several different areas of North America.
The disaster recovery response to Hurricane Katrina in late 2005 included U.S. federal government agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the United States Coast Guard (USCG), state and local-level agencies, federal and National Guard soldiers, non-governmental organizations, charities, and private individuals. Tens of thousands of volunteers and troops responded or were deployed to the disaster; most in the affected area but also throughout the U.S. at shelters set up in at least 19 states.
Canada was one of the countries to provide the most aid and relief for Hurricane Katrina. They provided ships, supplies, volunteers, search-and-rescue teams, and more. It has also accepted some evacuees to stay in Canada.
This article contains a historical timeline of the events of Hurricane Katrina on August 23–30, 2005 and its aftermath.
The Lower Ninth Ward is a neighborhood in the city of New Orleans, Louisiana. As the name implies, it is part of the 9th Ward of New Orleans. The Lower Ninth Ward is often thought of as the entire area within New Orleans downriver of the Industrial Canal; however, the City Planning Commission divides this area into the Lower Ninth Ward and Holy Cross neighborhoods.
The Common Ground Collective is a decentralized network of non-profit organizations offering support to the residents of New Orleans. It was formed in the fall of 2005 in the Algiers neighborhood of the city in the days after Hurricane Katrina resulted in widespread flooding, damage and deaths throughout the city.
Food for Life Global is a non-profit vegan food relief organization founded in 1995 to serve as the headquarters for Food for Life projects. Food for Life Global has its roots in ISKCON dating back to 1974. It is a completely independent non-profit organization that supports the work of Food for Life projects both inside and outside of ISKCON. Its network of 291 affiliates span the globe, with projects occupying over 65 countries. Volunteers provide over 1 million free meals daily. Food For Life engages in various sorts of hunger relief, including outreach to the homeless, provision for disadvantaged children throughout India, and provision for victims of natural disasters around the world.
Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU) is a consortium of American universities headquartered in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, with offices in Arvada, Colorado and Cincinnati, Ohio and staff at other locations across the country.
Direct Relief is a nonprofit humanitarian organization whose mission is to improve the lives of people in poverty or emergency situations by providing the appropriate medical resources. The charity provides emergency medical assistance and disaster relief in the United States and internationally. The organization is headed by an independent board of directors and its president and CEO, Thomas Tighe.
Oprah's Angel Network was a charity organized in 1998 and involved in various projects such as education supplies, school construction, disaster relief, and other areas.
Americares is a global non-profit organization focused on health and development that responds to individuals affected by poverty, disaster, or crisis. The organization addresses poverty, disasters, or crises with medicine, medical supplies and health programs.
The Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia in Houston is Indonesia's diplomatic facility in Houston, Texas, United States.
The New Waveland Café and New Waveland Clinic together formed a disaster response center consisting of a combination café, soup kitchen, medical clinic, donation center, and market, that operated free of charge from September 5 to December 1, 2005 in immediate Post-Katrina Mississippi Gulf Coast in Waveland, Hancock County, Mississippi. The cafe and clinic were founded in response to Hurricane Katrina and provided free food and free medical care to hurricane victims for three months. They were located in tents in the parking lot of Fred's Department Store at 790 Hwy 90 in Waveland, across the street from the destroyed and gutted Waveland Police Department. The New Waveland Cafe served three free meals every day to thousands of residents and volunteers. The New Waveland Clinic provided free health care to over 5,500 patient contacts. As well, a group of hippies and Christians came together to form a unique group which worked together to provide emergency relief.
Burners Without Borders (BWB) is a community-led NGO which initiates civic works projects and disaster relief in local communities around the globe.
All Hands and Hearts (AHAH) is a U.S. 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The organization's current structure formed in late 2017, when two existing nonprofits, All Hands Volunteers and Happy Hearts Fund merged to become All Hands and Hearts. All Hands Volunteers was founded in September 2005 by philanthropist and businessman David Campbell to provide relief to residents in areas affected by natural disasters worldwide. Happy Hearts Fund, founded by philanthropist and supermodel, Petra Němcová, sought a similar goal, to help communities recover after a disaster event. All Hands and Hearts is based in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts.
Melvyn Stiriss, a Plenty volunteer carpenter wrote about a year of Guatemalan earthquake reconstruction in Mayan Adventure, part 4 of Voluntary Peasants Labor of Love/The Farm Commune published by New Beat Books, Warwick, NY 2015