Today was a very important day. The advance team from Eight Days of Hope is in Cedar Rapids doing home assessments and planning for next weeks event. There are now 1341 people signed up to volunteer!
24 people gathered for lunch at New Covenant to discuss the Cedar Rapids building code; mechanical, electrical and plumbing inspections; and city expectations. Jim Thatcher, Code Enforcement Division Supervisor led the meeting.
This was an unprecedented meeting with city officials, union representatives, Serve the City and Eight Days of Hope volunteers sitting around the same table discussing how to best serve the people of our city. A special thank you to Jim Thatcher, Chief Electrical Inspector Gabriel Hart, Chief Mechanical Inspector Randy Croft, Building and Trades Manager Lyn Wedemeier, and Wayne Engle from Esco Electric for their willingness pave the way so that volunteers from groups like Eight Days of Hope can work in our community.
This evening Jim Thatcher gave the City Council an update on Eight Days of Hope. Charles Daugherty from Serve the City and Steve Tybor from Eight Days of Hope addressed the council and thanked them for their cooperation. Afterwards the Cedar Rapids Gazette and KCRG channel 9 interviewed Steve Tybor regarding the upcoming project. You can read the Gazette article here.
As Steve Tybor was leaving the City Council meeting, one man reached out his hand to thank Steve for coming to Cedar Rapids. He told Steve, "Take this, it's all I have on me" as he stuffed a wad of bills into Steve's hand. It was four, one dollar bills!
You can click on the picture above to see a slide show of the day. Tomorrow is another important day. Several teams are going to start electrical projects while others continue to do on-site home assessments. Pray for skilled volunteers, materials and the right mix of projects. And pray that we would be used of God to bring hope and healing to the residents of our city.
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