Non-profits displaced, but didn’t miss a beat with services

Myrt Bowers knew the swelling Cedar River was serious.

When she found out on Wednesday, June 11, 2008, that she and the rest of the Witwer Senior Center staff would have to leave the Witwer Building and the gas was being turned off, she knew.

Bowers, who has been associate executive director of the organization for 12 years, told employees that she'd let them know when their downtown Cedar Rapids space would reopen. Most likely Friday, she thought.

Two days later, the Cedar River crested at more than 31 feet, well above Cedar Rapids' 500-year flood plain.

“There's steps to get into our building,” Bowers says. “During all our discussion about the flood and what was going to happen, we never anticipated that we would have water in our building and the devastation that we would incur.”

Witwer, which delivered 530 meals daily to area seniors, was one of 47 area non-profits displaced by the flood. Staff members moved from St. Luke's Hospital to the Southeast Linn Community Center in Lisbon and Washington High School in Cedar Rapids, with little disruption in service.

That was the story of so many social service and charitable organizations in the wake of the 2008 flood. More than 50 non-profits and 32 faith organizations were damaged in the Corridor during the floods. Demand for nearly everything - from clothing and tools to financial help - pushed non-profits in the region hard.

The Linn Area Long Term Recovery Coalition, started in July 2008 for long-term flood response, helped bring together 70 organizations. The groups brought more than $20.5 million dollars in resources and services.

“We worked together to meet the needs of the community,” Bowers says of the non-profits. “That's what all of our missions are about.”

That ethos was behind the formation of Block by Block - a coalition of Matthew 25 Ministry Hub, the Affordable Housing Network and the Iowa Conference of The United Methodist Church - which formed in June 2009 to rebuild flood-damaged neighborhoods.

“I think there were lots of people going in lots of directions trying to have an impact - and they were having an impact - but they were trying to cover so much area in so many different ways, but there was no sense that a focused recovery was happening,” says Clint Twedt-Ball, Matthew 25 co-executive director, about the state of services before Block by Block's formation.

Even though the disaster claimed Matthew 25's office in the basement of Trinity United Methodist Church, in the immediate aftermath Twedt-Ball and other volunteers handed out donated homemade cookies to people in devastated areas, listening to their stories along the way.

Block by Block volunteers rehabilitated or reconstructed 159 homes, and the organization purchased another 44, some of which have been sold, during the organization's two and a half years of targeted efforts reaching 24 city blocks.

The Greater Cedar Rapids Community Foundation distributed $5.7 million from its Flood 2008 Fund to 81 area non-profits, with the mission of not only aiding relief but making sure the entities remained stable enough to provide support.

“These were organizations that we couldn't afford to have fail,” says Karla Twedt-Ball, who has been vice president of programs for the foundation since March 2007. She is married to Clint.

She and Les Garner, president of the foundation, say non-profits are uniquely equipped to act following disasters.

“Non-profits are nimble,” says Garner, who has been in his role since 2010. “That ability to respond quickly was critical after the flood.”

Block by Block's efforts continue today, although the Affordable Housing Network has shifted its focus to the Wellington Heights area. Repair projects are still part of the mission, as is maintenance of an urban farm in the 100-year flood plain.

“I think now we're also in the really challenging cases,” Clint Twedt-Ball says. “There aren't easy wins so much any more.”