Cedar Rapids natives seeking funds for Haiti project

Jim Condit is trying to raise $7,000 to paint an orphanage in Haiti.

"I decided that I needed to give back to the world," he said Thursday morning.

Condit, 59, said he's already bought his airline tickets - more than $1,000 - for the Oct. 1 trip. He's going to help lifelong friend Joe Krabacher paint the interiors of three buildings at Mercy & Sharing Village, the orphanage operated by the charity Krabacher and his wife founded in 1994.

Mercy & Sharing spent about $2.5 million in the year ending March 31, 2011, according to its most recent IRS filing. The non-profit has three full-time and a part-time employee in its U.S. offices in Aspen, Colo., and more than 200 workers, all native Haitians, in Haiti, according to Lou Fawcett, Mercy & Sharing's development director.

"We were there long before the earthquake and we're going to be there long after," said Fawcett.

The orphanage at Williamson, northwest of the capital city of Port Au Prince, is home to 126 children, Fawcett said. There's also a rehabilitation center for the facility's 56 children with disabilities, and a school attended by 250 children from the orphanage and nearby community.

"There's no other place like that in Haiti," said Fawcett.

Mercy & Sharing also operates two schools in the Port Au Prince area and feeding programs at Cap-Hatien on the island's north coast.

Condit, owner of Victorian Lace Bed & Breakfast in Marion and a non-denominational Christian minister who's performed more than 300 weddings since 2002, said he and Krabacher graduated from Cedar Rapids Kennedy High School in 1971. Krabacher is now a attorney in Aspen.

"We're just two local guys trying to help out the world," Condit said.

Condit, who expects to spend about five days in Haiti, said he's contacted a few area churches about raising funds for the project. He asks donations be made through

Mercy & Sharing's Web site or by mail to Mercy & Sharing, 201 N. Mill St., Suite 201, Aspen, CO 81611.