text:
Whenever an earthquake or hurricane hits, it is the poorest people who face the greatest risks. They often have no choice but to live in substandard housing that is not built to withstand the intensity of a high-magnitude quake or flood. This means poor and marginalized people are often more vulnerable to injury and death. To make matters worse, often those who do survive have the fewest material resources to recover from disasters. While earthquakes and hurricanes cannot be prevented, the fact that poor communities are disproportionately affected is not a natural condition. It is a human-made problem that results from cultural, socio-economic, political, and institutional factors.
Haiti has a painful history of political instability and humanitarian disasters. The country is still recovering from four serious storms that hit within a few weeks of each other in 2008. Hurricanes and earthquakes exacerbate extreme poverty: they damage neglected infrastructure like roads and drinking water systems, and further degrade the environment. The effects of the January 2010 earthquake will be felt long after the initial recovery period. Survivors—making do with limited resources—face years of hard work to recover. However, disaster losses in the short and long term can be substantially reduced by taking measures to decrease peoples' vulnerability and build their resilience in the face of hazardous events, whether it is improving immediate living conditions or addressing all the underlying causes of poverty that contribute to increased suffering at the time of emergencies.
Oxfam has been working in Haiti to create sustainable means of earning a living, help Haitians reduce their vulnerability to disasters, and strengthen and support people's ability to hold their government accountable. These long-term efforts meant that, when the earthquake hit, we already had staff on the ground ready to work with local organizations to respond to the humanitarian crisis.
No country can fully withstand the impact of an earthquake like the one that has rocked Haiti, especially a nation saddled with deep poverty and minimal infrastructure. We know that the communities we work with are strong and determined and will respond to this disaster as they have others. We have a shared responsibility to ensure that Haitians have the resources they need to avoid unnecessary suffering, both now and in the long run.
Help now by donating to our Haiti Earthquake Response Fund.
]]>More than 6 million farmers across the country grow teff, but it's here, in rugged Adi Ha, where rocks litter the fields like confetti, that this new kind of insurance may take root and spread. An initiative coordinated by Oxfam America and supported by more than a dozen partners, its goal is to help some of the world's poorest farmers bounce back when drought destroys their crops. And the payout isn't only in cash. It's in confidence—the kind that may help propel people out of poverty.
"Without insurance, poor farmers who experience drought might run through all their savings, fall into debt, or sell their livestock and other valuables—often to ruinous results," says Mengesha Gebremichael, the micro-insurance officer at the Relief Society of Tigray and one of the project's managers. "In contrast, insured farmers will be more resilient to those shocks. They'll be in a better position to take out small loans that could help them make big improvements in their next harvest—loans for things like high-yield seeds. They'll be more confident that they can pay the money back knowing they have insurance to support them if trouble strikes."
June to October marks the main rainy season in Adi Ha, a critical time for local farmers who depend on the skies to water their teff fields. For poor families living close to the edge, where even a $20 or $30 loss can push them over, there is no room for mishap. Without rain, they face disaster. That's where the weather insurance comes in. If a certain amount of rain fails to fall at a certain time, farmers who have purchased the insurance can receive a payout to help cover their losses.
In Ethiopia, families have always had traditional ways of coping with extraordinary expenses. If they lose their livestock in a disaster, such as drought, those who are better off will contribute an animal or two to help them rebuild their herds, for instance. Families may also share seeds for planting, or food when it's in terribly short supply.
But with climate change—and the erratic weather that it brings—the traditional means of surviving bad times may no longer be enough.
"Climate change is dramatically increasing agricultural risk across the planet," says Marjorie Victor Brans, a senior policy advisor at Oxfam America. "The frequency of droughts and other shocks in Adi Ha is likely to increase, and poor farmers will be among the hardest hit. It's a hugely challenging phenomenon."
With 85 percent of Ethiopians employed in farming, much of it rain-fed, the need for new tools to manage the risks is huge. But the market for insurance is miniscule: only about 300,000 people in a country of nearly 80 million now have it. Extending the option to rural areas is loaded with challenges, not the least of them being the concern that poor farmers simply don't have the money to pay for premiums—even the smallest one.
This new program has solved that problem with a simple solution: It has arranged for the poorest farmers to use their labor to buy insurance, tapping into a new social security initiative the Ethiopian government launched a few years ago. Called the Productive Safety Net Program, or PSNP, it helps about 8 million of the country's most vulnerable residents by providing them with food or cash in exchange for work. Through the PSNP, 130 Adi Ha farmers are now working extra days on community projects, such as planting trees and grasses to promote soil and water conservation, to pay for their premiums. In this pilot year, Oxfam provided funds to the PSNP to cover this part of the project.
The option to trade labor for insurance has substantially boosted the number of farmers able to participate in the program, nearly doubling the enrollment that was expected.
"It's good for me to have the insurance as long as I can work and pay with labor," says Medhin Reda, a single mother who will be working 24 days for her premium. "That is the only asset I have."
For Selas Samson Biru, who is spending 192 birr on insurance, it will help address the uncertainties that have always been part of farming, especially now that global warming may be altering familiar weather patterns.
"Our season is changing. We don't know when there will be a bad year and when there will be a good year," she says. "I believe, after taking the training, this insurance will be helpful during the bad season. This will pay me."
And the insurance may be extra helpful because it was tailored specifically for farmers like Biru. In fact, she was one of five community members chosen by villagers to join the insurance design team. Twenty-one other farmers participated in a series of test workshops on climate change and financial literacy. Focus group discussions and economic risk simulations carried out in the community helped the design team understand what kind of insurance product would work best in Adi Ha. And on the day of enrollment, about 600 farmers showed up for a host of activities explaining the offerings, including musical performances, a play, peer-to-peer outreach, and financial training.
"Today is a historic day for the farmers of Adi Ha," said Brans as the activities wound to a close that day and organizers counted the final tally of takers. Among the 200 were 75 women, which represents about 22 percent of all female-headed households in Adi Ha—one of the most vulnerable groups the project is aiming to help. On average, farmers are paying 138 birr for their premiums—or a little more than $12 each. Some chose packages that allowed them to pay as little as 76 birr, or about $6.75. The maximum premium was 288 birr, or just over $23.
"We are experimenting," said Gebru Kahsay a few months after investing 192 birr into an insurance package. "We started with teff. If we find the insurance is good, we'll continue. If we fail, we will take a lesson from it."
Lots of learning has already taken place during the 18 months Oxfam and its partners spent in preparation for the launch of this project. And each of those partners has been contributing its own expertise. Besides the Relief Society of Tigray, or REST, one of the largest aid groups in Africa which has worked closely with the people of Adi Ha, other partners include the Nyala Insurance Company, an Ethiopian firm that is providing the insurance; Swiss Re, one of the world's largest insurers which has helped fund the launch and is providing technical expertise; and the International Research Institute for Climate and Society at Columbia University, which is providing research on climate data. Additionally, the Dedebit Credit and Savings Institution, or DECSI, the primary provider of loans to families in Adi Ha, helped both to design the pilot and to educate farmers about the pros and cons of insurance.
"We had to work very hard to design a risk management package that was affordable and attractive to farmers, while still being potentially profitable to the insurance industry," says Bekabil Fufa, an agricultural expert in Oxfam America's Horn of Africa regional office. "And we had to make it compelling to government and donors who feel it will address the threat of climate change."
With a solid model now in place, Oxfam is planning in the coming year to expand the initiative into four new villages in Tigray--the region where Adi Ha is located—and into one village in Amhara, another drought-prone region to the south. Eventually, the project partners would like to see weather insurance offered to poor farmers throughout Ethiopia.
It will require a leap of faith by farmers across the country as well as support from the government, donors, NGOs, and the private sector," says Gebremichael. "But given the long lead times required to build resiliency to climate change, we can't afford to wait until tomorrow to try."
]]>The rise in numbers—from the current 250 million per year to 375 million by 2015—is due to the increasing threat of climate change-induced severe weather events and inability of millions of people worldwide to prepare to deal with such catastrophes. In the report, The Right to Survive, Oxfam America recommends adequate and urgent investments in climate change adaptation and an overhaul of the current system of humanitarian assistance in order to meet the challenge of more frequent and devastating disasters.
"Entrenched poverty in many parts of the world makes people more vulnerable to disasters," said Raymond C. Offenheiser, President of Oxfam America. "Climate change is already threatening our work to overcome poverty, and now it is increasing the pressure on our relief work. It is crucial that we tackle global warming head on by cutting dangerous greenhouse gas emissions, but we must also invest in community preparedness to cope with climate-related disasters."
According to the report, the international humanitarian system must change the way it delivers aid, with a focus on helping build countries' ability to prepare and withstand future shocks. The report recommends increased humanitarian aid to ensure there is adequate funding to support timely, effective, and good-quality humanitarian action. In addition, Oxfam urged aid providers—including the US government—to act impartially after a disaster, investing money and effort to commensurate with the levels of need.
As climate-related disasters increase, aid must be more focused on preparing communities, working with local NGOs and governments to create relief that works in the long-term, and helping make vulnerable communities stronger in the face of climate change.
"Communities around the world have the knowledge and experience to craft their response to the negative impacts of climate change, but they need adequate funding to make it happen," said Offenheiser. "Investing in community resilience, especially for the most vulnerable, must be a cornerstone of any American effort on climate change."
The report is released right as important climate change legislation is moving through the Energy and Commerce Committee of the House of Representatives and as the White House prepares to host a high-level meeting of developed countries in Washington on climate change.
"Now is the time for bold action on climate," said Offenheiser. "We must not only improve our response to disasters, but also fund measures that help communities adapt to climate change. After all, it is poverty and failure to recognize everyone's right to survive that turn a storm into a disaster."
UPDATE: April 2011
This note is to briefly explain why Oxfam has revised its view of its 2009 forecast of a likely rise in the number of people affected by climate-related disasters.
Two years ago Oxfam did an analysis of the number of people affected by past climate-related events. From this analysis we made a forecast that by 2015 it was likely that the average annual number of people affected by climate-related disasters would be 375 million and this represented an increase of 54 per cent compared with the average figure of the decade 1998-2007.
Having reviewed the data and the method we used to analyse the data we are no longer confident in the specific approach we used, given the nature of the data, as described below, and so we are no longer confident of this specific forecast.
Our concerns are essentially two-fold: the limitations of the data and the limitations of the way we analysed the data.
The limitations of the data: The data we used was from EM-DAT, the international disaster database managed by CRED, the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters. This is a respected set of data which captures, amongst other things, the number of disasters that has happened and the number of people affected.
Like most sets of data it has its limitations. In EM-DAT's case one of the key limitations is that the more recent data is more reliable. This was well known to us and we dealt with this in our analysis by using double exponential smoothing on the data (see the explanation of how we carried out the analysis and catered for the data's limitation).
However one limitation we did not know at the time and have only recently discovered is that the number of people affected by climate-related disasters in China is unusually low in first half of the 1980s when compared with subsequent years. It is highly likely that this is the result of under reporting from China. Given the size of China's population its disaster figures are significant when considering the global picture. The likely impact of this on our forecast may mean that we started our analysis with data from 1980 that was likely to be unreasonably low and therefore made our projected increase in the number of people affected artificially high.
We now know that there has been a significant increase in reporting from many other countries over the same period due to better information and communication.
Limitations of our analysis: Though we were clear in our explanation of the way we came to our conclusion that "different forecasting models could lead to different results," what we should have done, particularly given the high volatility of the data especially in 2002, was run these different models to help determine the degree of confidence in the conclusion we came to.
It does not mean though that there will not be an increase in the numbers of people affected by disasters in the future. There is evidence to point to this likelihood.
According to EM-DAT the number of climate-related disasters has increased by 35 per cent from the 1990s to the 2000s. Floods have increased by 50 per cent over the same period. Munich Re's database of global disasters also shows an increasing trend in climate-related events. It is not possible to know how much of this is an increase in events or better reporting of events and neither can we assume that an increase in events will lead to an equal increase in numbers affected.
Population growth means that there is a likelihood of more people being affected by climate-related events.
The number of people exposed to some climate-related events is also on the increase. According to the forthcoming United Nations Global Assessment Report 2011 the number of people exposed to floods and cyclones has doubled between 1970 and 2010. It is likely that many people who are 'exposed' to hazards are not affected due to measures that protect them, such as flood defences for example. However in many vulnerable countries investment and efforts to reduce significantly the risk of disasters is sorely lacking leaving millions exposed and likely to be affected by disasters.
Finally as the effects of climate change become more apparent there are more frequent and more intense climate-related events according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report.
Oxfam is in the process of further research into the number of people affected by climate-related events and will be publishing the results of this research in due course.
That was 15 years ago. Today, clean water in the small communities of El Recuerdo and Agua Zarca is as precious as ever—and still hard to get. There's no turning on the tap over a kitchen sink and letting the gallons gush. Here, many people trudge to a communal source, fill their jugs, and lug the heavy load home again. But seasonal flooding—sometimes hugely destructive and, with climate change, possibly becoming more severe—contaminates many of the area's hand-dug wells, exposing people to waterborne illnesses.
But now, with the help of Oxfam America and its local partner, PROVIDA, the well that Cruz worked so hard to dig on the school grounds in El Recuerdo is pumping enough clean water to satisfy the drinking needs not only of the students but of about 80 families in the surrounding area. The well is one of five "healthy wells" in southern Zacatecoluca province PROVIDA lined, surrounded with a filter, capped to ensure its cleanliness, and outfitted with a pump that sends water to a large tank for chlorination and storage.
"The families in this area are living in extreme poverty, living as subsistence farmers or low paid day laborers in the nearby sugar cane plantations," says Karina Copen, an Oxfam humanitarian program officer. "They face numerous challenges in having to adapt to the increased frequency and intensity of the flooding in their area. With access to a healthy well, they can at least know that in the next flood, they will have a safe source of water for their families and the good health that comes along with it."
Adaptations, such as these healthy wells, are essential for Salvadoran families living in the department of La Paz in the lower region of the Lempa River where seasonal rains, tropical depressions, and hurricanes, make it one of the country's most flood-prone areas.
Coupled with those natural hazards is the fact that communities in the region have significantly less access to improved water sources and sanitation than other parts of the country. The "healthy wells" along with 27 new composting latrines have been a boon to families in the area.
"Kids are getting sick less; families are healthier," says Santos Efrain Coto, one of the local leaders in El Recuerdo. "When they drank contaminated water they got diarrhea and parasites."
The improved wells are based on a model that's new to El Salvador and designed by an organization called Swiss Labour Assistance. Besides having their tops sealed with cement to prevent polluted flood waters from slopping in, the wells are lined with a type of plastic pipe, known as polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, that extends down into the aquifer. Packed around the outside of the lining is a filter of volcanic rock that prevents contamination from seeping through underground.
At the El Recuerdo school one day recently, teacher Ana Elsa Cubias describes how students used to bring their own water from home to drink during the school day. Now, the refurbished well guarantees them a clean supply right on the spot.
"They're drinking water from a protected source and the kids have water right in the classroom," says Cubias.
A short distance from the classrooms sits a large plastic tank, sky blue and able to hold 1,100 liters of water pumped fresh from the well. Chlorinated, the water from the tank flows to two taps standing just outside the gates to the school. They're accessible to whoever is driving or walking by. And to ensure the stored water stays safe for drinking, the water committee arranges to have the tank cleaned every couple of weeks—a task that falls to a child small enough to wiggle inside and scrub the interior walls with a brush and bleach.
"We make sure he bathes before he gets in the tank," adds Coto, the local leader.
In Agua Zarca, a few communities over, Jose Luis Funes Cruze says that before PROVIDA and Oxfam installed the new well, most of the local residents depended on their own backyard wells for drinking water—and that was a problem.
"The household wells take on a lot of rain water and a lot of filthy water when there's flooding," says Cruz, pointing in the direction of the polluted San Antonio River, which spills its banks during big storms. "The things people throw in—there are pigs up river. And the cheese factory is up river."
In the past, when their drinking supply has been contaminated, families in Agua Zarca have had to rely on the government or aid groups to truck in drinking water for them.
But now, with a new communal well their supply of drinking water is much improved.
"We're very grateful—the whole community is—to have that water," says Blanca Lidia Jiménez, who lives close to the well makes about six trips a day to fetch enough water for the seven people in her house. "We don't get sick so much when we drink the water from this well. The little kids would get swollen bellies, but with the new well that problem has been solved."
Still, the situation in Agua Zarca points to the challenges of providing clean water in this area. The community's new well was built on the only land available: next to a cow pasture—an arrangement that could be problematic during the wet season when rain sloshes manure about and allows it to seep into the groundwater.
The deep plastic lining on the well and its volcanic-rock filter help, though, says Guillermo Morán, a professor and researcher at the University of El Salvador's Earth Sciences Institute. He worked with Oxfam America and another of its partners, the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI), to evaluate the effectiveness of the wells while studying the health practices of families who use them.
The study is an important component of Oxfam's public health work: It promotes accountability and offers a different model for aid groups by linking their work with that of universities.
"We have the field experience and they have the technical expertise," says Miriam Aschkenasy, Oxfam America's public health specialist. "Together we're able to evaluate programs at a higher standard and at one that increases accountability."
In its draft report, HHI said that individuals who live in communities with "healthy wells" were less likely to have diarrhea and reported fewer cases of the illness during the time of the study. But the draft report also revealed that in two of those communities, some people were still using hand-dug wells for their drinking water while other people from places without "healthy wells" were making the trek to a community that had one to fetch their water.
"The study gives us insight in a way we couldn't have anticipated," says Aschkenasy. "It gives us an idea of where to focus in the future. We now know we need to find a way to encourage people who are still relying on the hand-dug wells to use the healthy ones instead. And it gives us great incentive to build more of them."
]]>— Padmanaban, farmer of Sengapadai
The farmers of the village of Sengapadai, India, make it their business to know what's coming. They are fortune-tellers of sorts, who look deep into history in order to forecast the future. Using methods that have evolved over thousands of years, they watch the movement of the stars, notice the feel of the wind on a given day of the month or year, and carefully observe the behavior of plants and animals. At the heart of the mysteries they set out to unravel each year is this: When will the rains come?
If they miscalculate, the consequences can be grave. In years past, it has meant families postponed not only weddings but also medical care. Sons and daughters have dropped out of school, ending their formal education. They've pawned their jewelry, which represents their savings—even the necklaces that symbolize their marriages. And, says 51-year-old Jakkammal, "In a bad year, there's only one meal a day."
The specter of bad harvests looms larger than ever these days because, as one farmer put it, "We are not getting proper rain."
Rains are coming when they shouldn't and not coming when they should, and the traditional forecasting methods, unable to adapt to the speed of change, are losing their power to predict.
"There's been a vast difference in rainfall patterns in the last 10 years," says Jeeva Rathinam, another farmer. "Before that, we used to plan properly and plant one kind of seed in the fields. Now we have to mix them together and see what comes up."
"The rainfall variations these farmers are seeing now are defeating their knowledge of the way nature functions," says Hari Krishna, Oxfam's research program manager in India.
Climate change, in other words, has come to Sengapadai.
The DHAN Foundation's ACEDRR, an Oxfam partner, has set out to help communities adjust to the changing climate landscape. Researcher B. Arthirani, herself the daughter of farmers, gathered and analyzed 40 years' worth of local rainfall data, and on a sweltering day in May 2008, the farmers of Sengapadai came together to learn the results.
Rains that once fell here predictably in July, she told them, can now be expected to arrive in late August. Then she made a proposal: delay sowing peanuts until between Aug. 10 and 16.
A heated discussion followed. Shifting to accommodate the rains could make some crops more vulnerable to infestations of weeds and pests, and the farmers argued pros and cons of various plans. But an hour later, everyone had come to agreement: the best way to balance all the factors would probably be to plant corn in September.
This is not research as it's conducted at universities, where academics carry out studies at a comfortable distance from actual farmers, and where recommendations are conveyed to the villagers in top-down fashion. That day's discussion, which began with Arthirani's educated guess about what to sow when, ended with a practical plan that drew on knowledge from both inside and outside the community. The ACEDRR study, says Arthirani, "is not a one-way process."
Community members are not simply considered beneficiaries of the study, explained Hari Krishna. "Here, they are partners in the research. They know best about their soil, their sky, their water, and what crops suit their needs."
Outside the meeting place, a heifer nosed along the roadside looking for something to graze on, and a bullock cart passed by with a load of fodder. Women headloading firewood and water walked along the dusty main street in the fierce midday sun, and in the distance, a man stood knee-deep in a pond, splashing water on his team of bullocks after what had probably been a morning of hard labor in the fields.
Fossil fuels and all their labor-saving pleasures seem to have bypassed this village entirely. There were no cars or tractors in sight, and despite the scorching temperature, no one was heading home to air conditioning or refrigerated drinks. It is a painful irony that many of those who have done least to bring about climate change are the most vulnerable to its effects.
DHAN is tackling that vulnerability on two fronts: the disaster-oriented research of ACEDRR is helping ensure that changing rainfall patterns don't lead to catastrophic crop losses, while DHAN's development programs are building resilience in other ways—helping those same farmers organize themselves into self-help groups that enable savings and investment; creating federations that have clout in the marketplace; and helping farmers gain access to high-quality seed, affordable insurance, and lenders that charge two percent interest instead of ten.
It is an approach that is working. By November it was clear that the shift from peanuts to corn was a big success. But there are signs everywhere of the growing security of this community—most convincingly in the confident smile of Jakkammal. The days of one bad harvest plunging the community into debt and hunger, it seems, are over. "After joining DHAN," she says, "we are able to have three meals."
]]>But it has—four times already this year, sloshing mud through homes, polluting wells, and forcing families in this hilly Sri Lankan district of Ratnapura to flee to higher ground until the water recedes. And while they're gone, their lives are on hold: Men can't get to work, children miss school, and women labor doubly hard over household tasks in temporary quarters.
"We're sick of the floods—going here and there, cleaning, interrupting children's education and livelihoods," said Renuka Damayanthi, a 35-year-old mother. "We have to re-organize and rebuild again and again."
There may be no worthier a place for developing a plan to reduce the risk of disasters than here in the small villages tucked into the undergrowth along the Kalu River. And there may be no women more able to help with that task than those who have evacuated their homes as many times as these women have, scurrying to gather the few household goods they know their families will need to survive. And now, with the increased frequency of those floods hinting at climate change, the need to find ways to cut down on the trouble they cause is more urgent than ever.
How involved have women become in efforts to reduce the chance their families and neighbors will run into serious difficulties from floods and landslides? And what might be holding the women back?
Those are among the central questions in a new piece of research aimed at influencing how governments think about long-lasting ways for keeping people, their assets, and their means of earning a living safe—especially in places prone to beatings from Mother Nature. In the language of the experts, that safe-keeping is known as disaster risk reduction, or DRR. Carried out by the Institute for Participatory Interaction Development and funded by Oxfam, the research is directed at promoting equal participation of both men and women in these new disaster-related initiatives.
"Women are the ones mostly affected by disaster—and the most vulnerable—and the response system isn't sensitive to looking into women's needs," said Indira Aryaratne, the lead researcher for the study, which focuses on six areas within two districts of Sri Lanka.
The research was spurred by the 2004 tsunami, as was a new countrywide focus on disaster management. But around the communities of Muwagama and Haldolla, that effort has been slow to materialize—as Aryaratne discovered in the course of meeting with scores of villagers. In Haldolla, for instance, officials called a meeting in 2006 to begin organizing a local disaster management program and to appoint people to a variety of subcommittees, but that's as far as it went. Villagers haven't met since to discuss the initiative.
"It will take a long time to internalize a strong community role in disaster risk reduction," said D. Wicramaarachi, the government official in charge of a small division of four villages. The concept is new, he said, and people have not yet embraced the idea that they can form committees that will play an important part in their futures.
And committees are just the beginning of the process, added Aryaratne. Disaster risk reduction has to become a way of thinking that should be reflected across the decisions a community makes for itself.
"DRR is a way of life," said Aryaratne. "It's not a one-off activity. Just forming a committee is not going to serve any purpose."
Slow as communities may be to organize formally around the concept, women—and men—in water-logged communities have plenty of ideas about what steps need to be taken to improve the safety and security of their families. Encouraging their direct participation in her research, Aryaratne has gathered a host of suggestions from villagers. She intends to share them with government officials and other stakeholders at a workshop.
On a hot afternoon in Haldolla, villagers came to participate in one of Aryaratne's focus groups. From large sheets of brown paper taped to the wall in the Haldolla community center, they took turns reading off their ideas for coping with the floods. Among the proposals the women had was the creation of a communal farm on land above flood level where they could grow vegetables to ensure their families had food. They asked to receive first-aid training that would focus specifically on medical problems related to floods, such as water-borne diseases. And they suggested constructing a bridge over a section of the river that would allow everyone easy access out of the area.
A short distance away, in Muwagama, women have also been thinking a lot about the flooding and how to better manage their lives around it. A group of them recently petitioned the local authorities for a boat to use during emergencies. They have also formed their own women's committee and have asked the government to authorize the committee to distribute relief food to flood victims, thereby ensuring that all local families in need get help.
Figuring out ways to cope with the inevitable is just one part of ensuring safety in areas like Muwagama. Being aware of the risks in living there is another. And whether villagers call it disaster risk reduction or not, knowing when rains will fall is key to preparing for them. The Singhalese New Year, which comes in April, is part of their calculation: a month and a half later the monsoon arrives.
"They know that after 45 days, there will be a flood," said Wicramaarachi, the local government official. "That's the traditional knowledge."
But traditional knowledge may now be butting up against climate change, demanding new ways of dealing with old problems.
"There have been changes in climate in the last five years. Massive floods used to happen every five years, but now it's 2008 and we've already faced four major floods," said Wicramaarachi.
Some also suspect that an increase in sand mining along river banks and on steep slopes surrounding the area could be adding to the flooding problem.
There have been so many floods lately that Damayanthi, the young mother from Muwagama, now no longer bothers to unpack the household goods she usually takes with her during evacuations. She has left them in satchels, ready to grab for the next time.
But so far, none of those times have been as bad as the terrible flood of 2003. One man in Haldolla said the water during that disaster reached as high as the electrical wires strung high overhead on poles along the road.
That was the flood that washed away K.G. Kandawathie's home next to the river—the one she had built with 12 years worth of savings from her job as house maid for a Korean family. She built a second home in the same location but now, with the recent series of floods, Kandawathie, 60, is feeling the strain.
"The best thing is to move away," she said.
For many people that won't be possible, and that's why embracing the concept of disaster risk reduction may be the smartest alternative for the Kalu River communities.
"If you can do something about the flooding that's the best idea," said Damayanthi, who is already sold on the concept. "Even if it's out of our control, we can reduce the damage."
]]>Watching her in action, in her long orange tunic, it's clear that Aryarathne has found her calling—far from where she began in a Sri Lankan architectural firm working on designs for multi-national companies.
How did she wind up here, near the Kalu River in the Ratnapura district of Sri Lanka, helping women think about how to keep their families safe and ease the constant hardship that flooding brings?
"I always had a passion to do something for people who are less privileged than me," says Aryarathne. During her university years—as she was working toward her goal of becoming an architect—she couldn't help but think about the community outside the institution's walls: It was impoverished and yet the development of the university had done little to address that poverty. That fact bothered her deeply.
But it wasn't until Aryarathne landed her first architectural job that she got the chance to tackle that kind of injustice herself. Her firm won a contract to develop a Colombo laundry facility—a place where scores of people manually wash clothes and linens on a large scale for clients such as hotels and hospitals. The laundry sat on prime property that a multi-national company wanted to develop—and the city had agreed to let it go ahead in exchange for the corporation's commitment to build a replacement facility.
The design of that new facility fell to Aryarathne. And right from the beginning she followed the instincts that led her to where she is now: a consultant and trainer working with poor and marginalized people who have a great deal to say about how to improve their lives, but little opportunity to be heard.
Warned that the washers could become unruly and that she should be careful, Aryarathne visited the old laundry facility. Instead of being afraid, she found herself deep in conversation with the people there—after telling them the truth about the construction proposal. If it happens, she asked, what would they like a new facility to include?
The floodgates opened, and though she didn't know it then, Aryarathne had her first exhilarating experience with participatory action research—a method of working with communities on problems whose solutions they will own. At that first laundry meeting, she learned everything about their work, from soaking and soaping, to boiling and hammering.
"That was my first exposure to a community—and it was really good," said Aryarathne. "I knew they had a lot to tell me and all that my boss had said was not true."
Soon after followed other participatory architectural projects, and gradually Aryarathne came to see where her real interests lay: With people working on initiatives that will improve their lives.
Fourteen years ago—leaving behind years of training and a budding architectural career—she made the shift from the private sector into the development world. And she hasn't looked back.
"This is more satisfying than architecture," says Aryarathne.
In the small community building in Ratnapura, the session with community members comes to an end. Aryarathne looks thoughtful as she folds up the charts she has just made with their help—charts that list the problems associated with flooding and some of the solutions villagers have proposed. She will compile the findings for an Oxfam-supported study aimed at promoting equal participation of both men and women in programs to reduce their risk of disaster.
"Architects are at the service of rich people," said Aryarathne later. "Just as you cater to multi-millionaires, villagers need our services, too."
]]>On this hot August morning in a small fishing village on Sri Lanka's southern coast, he is probing locals for a full understanding of what well-being means to them. He remains serene as they squabble a bit, call each other liars, and offer up whole new categories no one has mentioned before. When a group of men can't agree on a set of criteria, he announces a tie and allows both points to become part of the findings.
Such is the life of a researcher engaged in the ebb and flow of a study that allows its authors to enter into a direct dialogue with the community they are focusing on. The approach is called participatory action research—a method Weerackody believes in deeply. He is applying it to a piece of research intended to expand the understanding of mental health issues in Sri Lankan communities affected by natural disasters or long-term conflict. Funded partially by Oxfam, the study is part of a large, four-year project conducted by investigators from McGill University. This piece is being carried out by the People's Rural Development Association, McGill's local partner.
"People are never given a chance to participate in the decision-making process," says Weerackody. "And this is what we need"
That lesson became all too clear in an earlier study he had helped to conduct on the impact of the aid system on communities affected by the tsunami. People received goods that weren't relevant to their lives, that were of poor quality, that weren't useful, says Weerackody—all because no one had bothered to consult with the communities themselves.
"It's about attitude and the way the colonial system was established," he adds. That system says decisions should be made by technical experts or politicians. "They think people don't know what they want."
Weerackody thinks otherwise.
"If it is decided by someone else, people don't have any feeling it is part of their lives," he says. And aid agencies have enough experience building roads, community halls, culverts, and the like to know quite well what will happen if beneficiaries aren't involved from the start: As nice as the facilities are, they won't be maintained, says Weerackody.
A relocated fishing village in which he has been conducting research recently offers a case in point. The hillside homes, sturdy but small, now house 55 families formerly living near the sea, and a newly built community center at the top of the hill serves as gathering place for all.
"They have a house but they're not happy," says Weerackody. "That house was not spacious. They can't entertain their relatives. They don't have enough place to sleep. One woman said she can't even make love with her husband. The lesson we learn from the study is you may design houses, but what's needed by development workers is to take into consideration other aspects of well-being."
From a rural community himself, Weerackody, who has been working in participatory development since 1982, says he takes pleasure in meeting with local people to learn about their opinions and needs—an important perspective to understand since so much of the country's population is rural. About 80 percent of Sri Lankans live in rural areas, Weerackody points out. And whenever he's got a free moment, he heads out of Colombo, Sri Lanka's capital and his current home, to visit the village in which he was raised.
"I have a strong belief in community consultation," he says. "Development workers should respect the communities and should win the trust and confidence of communities."
]]>Until then, the Dhan Foundation had never been involved in disaster response. But when the team got back to Tamil Nadu, they learned something new: that people engaged in Dhan Foundation's long-term savings groups and federations had been the first to respond to the tsunami in their communities.
"They had the networks and the resources they needed to respond," says R. Sangeetha, who at the time was a faculty member at Tata-Dhan. This gave the team an idea: Dhan could respond to the tsunami in the coastal areas, but not just for the short term.
"Instead, we decided to commit to working there on a long-term basis," said Sangeetha, to provide relief and rehabilitation, but also to reduce the risks and vulnerabilities of those communities to future disasters. Oxfam helped the Tata-Dhan Academy take this commitment a step further, supporting them to create the Advanced Center for Enabling Disaster Risk Reduction (ACEDRR), an institute within the academy that helps communities that participate in Dhan's development programs reduce the risk that a disaster will undo their hard-won gains against poverty. Sangeetha became the coordinator of the center.
The goal, says Sangeetha, is to "help development professionals to see every development action in a disaster risk reduction perspective."
People her whole life told Sangeetha that she would thrive in a service job, working with the very poor, and she agrees. "It's in my nature," she says.
She studied agricultural management at university, and decided to take a two-year job in social work to see if she liked it.
Her first job was with a tribal community in the north of the country. She lights up when she remembers it. "I loved it there," she says. "You would always find me in the communities, playing with the children or talking to people. I never wanted to leave at the end of the day."
It was early in her tenure there that she observed some children playing ball, and one girl sitting out. She asked the girl why she wasn't playing. "She said she had cancer in her legs," says Sangeetha. "The other children knew she had cancer, too. But no one knew what it meant to have cancer."
Sangeetha knew that cancer untreated would be deadly, and took it upon herself to get the child the care she needed. But when she took her to the hospital, she got some terrible news: The girl would have to lose her legs.
Sangeetha fights tears discussing this experience, even so many years later.
She counseled the family and the community, who were skeptical of harsh medical interventions like this one. Eventually, though, they decided to opt for surgery. "It was a very hard time," Sangeetha says. "I was with her every day in the hospital."
Now, seven years later, the child is 17 and healthy. Sangeetha has done her best to keep in touch the girl and her family, though it's been at least a year since she's heard anything. That experience made her decide to continue helping people as best she could.
Of her career choice, Sangeetha says "it's such hard work, but it's such important work. Even if you just help one person, it's worthwhile."
"And everyone here feels the same way," she says, gesturing to the Tata-Dhan Academy. "They all care so much. That is why this is such a wonderful place to be."


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"Mansion Tax" not going ahead (for now)
August 22nd, 2011 by Karelia | No Comments | Filed in London Buyer's Agents, London House Prices, Property Market NewsAs London Buyer's Agents we were interested to read a recent interview with The Telegraph (http://tgr.ph/n7WTGf) where Eric Pickles, the secretary of state for communities and local government has said that it would be a, "very big mistake", to go ahead with any form of the Liberal Democrat's proposed "mansion tax" on properties worth over £1 million.
A 1% annual tax applied to houses worth more than £1 million was first proposed at the Liberal Democrat party conference of 2009. The suggested threshold was later increased to properties worth more than £2 million, and this year the policy was refined further, with the Liberal Democrat Party suggesting that there should be a levy of 1% on capital gains tax from the sale of a property after the first £1million. .
This is an obvious attempt to make owners of high value property in the UK, whether British or foreign citizens, to pay up in order to share the burden caused by the national deficit, a questionable source of revenue when you stop to consider that an overhaul of the current council tax system has been estimated to cost upwards of £250million.
Although unlikely to temper overseas buyers' zeal for good quality, high-end property in prime central London, a "mansion tax" is likely to dissuade middle-class British buyers from progressing up the property ladder. They are instead likely to decide to remain where they are, which would decrease the amount of property below £1million that comes onto the market, negatively affecting both ends of the market.
It is also possible for an astute property investor to buy property below the £1 million mark, and develop the property sufficiently after its official government valuation and still benefit from their investment, which makes the £1 million threshold seem rather arbitrary indeed.
There would be an uneven burden on home-owners in London and the South-East where the value of property continues to increase despite the recession. Eric Pickles rightly said last week that it would be, "imposing taxation on the back of changes in property value". Following Eric Pickle's interview it seems unlikely for now that any version of the "mansion tax" is likely to be passed under this coalition government, however much the Liberal Democrats want to replace the 50p tax rate for high earners with a tax for so-called "unearned wealth". This would negatively affect people who are house-rich, but cash-poor, and whose life earnings have been channelled into their property, with a view of it being a retirement safety net, or a legacy for their children. Many people view their home as an investment, and I don't believe that people should be taxed for choosing to invest their money well, and having their savings in bricks and mortar.
Tags: Buyers agents, government policy, Hackney house prices, House prices in London, London property, mansion tax, Property News, recession

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Stunningly Intricate: Curta Mechanical Calculator
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20 Comments:
- said...
There is a museum in Bonn, Germany called Arithmeum full of these types of calculators. Even a few with manuals so you can try them out.
"The Arithmeum was openend in 1999. With over 1,200 objects it has the world's largest collection of historical mechanical calculating machines. The museum is affiliated with the Research Institute for Discrete Mathematics." (Wikipedia article on University of Bonn) - said...
Wow! They sure dont make them like they used to now do they! LOL.
www.anonymize.kr.tc - said...
It is a shame that while incarcerated and working on a mechanical calculator, the fellows over at Bletchly Park were working on building programmable computers.
- said...
I used one of those calculators... my father was an engineer and had one in his office.
Yes it was a marvel, the only device of it's type that was really portable.
As I dimly recall, it was quite expensive back in the day. - Pokoje Zakopane said...
look at this:
Soviet calculators collection - J.L said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
- Fred Kiesche said...
Ah well, first William Gibson wrote about them and I could not longer to buy one. Now you picked up on it, dang it, so I'll still be unable to acquire one!
Almost as fun: slide rules! - Paul J said...
These were very popular with car rallyists in the 60's and early 70's to calculate the time you should be at a particular spot. My navigator used one for many years and I have fond memories of its subtle clicks and grinds. It was perfectly adapted to update the time going into a car rallye checkpoint, you simply spun the crank once for every .01 mile and checked this against the clock. Specialized microprocessor based computers eventually obsoleted them, but not until the late 70's.
- dogu said...
Those larger table mounted calc look very familiar. When I started college ('72), only the engineers had electronic calculators - HPs were THE status symbol. Us chemists had to do with mechanical computation machines for the first couple of years. I don't remember much about them except you set up the computation by twirling dials, then hit some switch and the thing went into overdirve; stuff whirred, turned, clicked, and clacked until ...ding...out came an answer. Very cool. I wish I'd had the foresight to snag one once electronic hand calculators took off.
- Retired Geezer said...
I still have my Curta. It's the larger of the two models.
You'll never guess what we used it for. Doing Time/Speed/Distance car rallyes with the Sports Car Club of America. - Stickmaker said...
I remember an article in _Byte_, back in the Seventies, talking about how portable music boxes - many the size and shape of goose eggs, built as the handles of canes - had greater memory storage density than any electronic memory available at the time the article was written.
Imagine something like that mated to an advanced Curta to provide operating system and non-volatile memory. - dogu said...
Check out the Wikipedia article on Jacquard looms. Punch card driven Computer Aided Manufacturing waaaay before IBM developed punch cards.
- said...
I spent many happy hours as a kid doing some real "number crunching" on my Dad's pepper grinder, Curta.
And like Retired Geezer, I used it for rallying as well. My Dad and I surprised a lot of people at my first rally. They got beat by a driver who missed the driver's meeting and 9 year old boy doing the navigating. :) - said...
o.o my maths teacher has one of those russian calculator things... its dessign is a little different but its all there... (was playing with it yesterday)
- Peter said...
- said...
Is this the 'Gonkulator' referred to by Hogan's Heroes?
- said...
I want one.
- sunset canvas said...
LOL - said...
This is the coolest video I was able to find on it...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kf_xcu9g_4g - SittingMooseShaman said...
...metal! Beautiful, machined metal parts, frame and housing.
Wonderful metal...so missing in todays' market of
combustible petrol- plastics.
That cloak everything from lap-tops to couches...
Rendering our homes as oil-tanks, just waiting for whenever they catch the flame.
Then, burst into searing, smoking conflagration...
The fire insurance agent shows up with a Curta!
He knows...
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2 Meetup Groups match "Montage" near Oakland, CA
A group to explore all things Montage: The HTML5 framework as well as the tools to support it.
Awaken Your Innate Sense of Humor to Bring Joy and Laughter into Everyday Life Using the tools of the greatest spiritual warriors, laughter and humor, we will train to be sacred tricksters and delightful devas (picture the Rocky montage, but you're wearing a clown nose, and instead of bounding through rubber tires, it's rubber chickens.) In a safe and compassionate space, the Ha-Ha meets the Ah-Ha, and transforming your everyday awareness into a kind of magical realism. The Enlighten UP Process …
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Classic one-button coat and lapel sylings. Complete with White lined lapels, modest black bow tie, and an elegant red rose.
This great product in black from our department Men and T-Shirt category can be printed just for you in the size and style you like. The design TUXEDO with Red Rose was created by InnerStorm and uploaded to Spreadshirt for you to have printed on a T-Shirt. Next to a host of other great designs, you can find this TUXEDO with Red Rose design in Spreadshirt's Weddings category. If you are interested in topics like Bachelor Party or Custom T-Shirt, then you'll love TUXEDO with Red Rose designs by InnerStorm. Spreadshirt also offers a huge selection of t-shirts, hoodies and accessories for the category Weddings as well as top Custom Tuxedo Shirt clothing. InnerStorm's designs have already impressed many of our customers, so we are sure that we've got right stuff for you! Spreadshirt is your address for great designs of all kinds – whether it's Bachelor Party, Custom T-Shirt or Custom Tuxedo Shirt. We are sure that you will find something nice in our shop, there are many amazing Weddings t-shirts, hoodies or accessories for you to find!Tags: Design ID: 10387408
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This relaxed fit cotton t-shirt for men has a seamless rib collar with double-needle cover-stitching, shoulder-to-shoulder taping, double-needle sleeve and bottom hem. The shirt is made from 100% pre-shrunk cotton and has a relatively light fabric weight of 5.3 oz. Light oxford is made from made from 99% cotton/1% polyester.


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A man goes crazy and threatens to
kill his family and shoot up police in Southeast Portland. That led to a tense
standoff with Portland Police Wednesday evening. Commuters were on their
way home while police raced to the 4400 block of Southeast 61st with
lights and sirens blaring. Portland Polices CERT Team knew they had to act
fast. 59-year old Thomas Elia was screaming "I'm going to kill
you," that he was "going to find you wherever you are and kill
you," and that he was going to "shoot it out" with the police,
according to SGT Pete Simpson. A caller to 911 said that her boyfriend had
assaulted her daughter and that her grandson and the daughter had escaped the
house. However the caller was still inside hiding from the armed boyfriend
while on the phone to dispatchers. In fear for the women's life the CERT team executed
a "hasty rescue plan". They used flash bang grenades to
distract Elia and take him into custody. The woman was found safely and was
unharmed. Simpson says he does not know why this happened but said "well
we don't know exactly what sparked it but we received information from the
victim that he's in the process of having a sex change, and undergoing some
hormone changes and that he's self-medicating on top of that".
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Synopsis: Master animator Richard Williams (best known for his work on Who Framed Roger Rabbit?) created this visually dazzling full-length cartoon. Tack (voice of Matthew Broderick) is a shy and humble cobbler in love with the beautiful Princess Yum Yum (voice of Jennifer Beals). Tack gets his chance to impress the Princess when he's pressed into service to... Continue Reading
Starring: Jennifer Beals, Matthew Broderick, Jonathan Winters, Donald Pleasence


text:
Lenz Couple Is Selling Art for the Kids
The buzz around the February art auctions is palpable. Sure, Christie's and Phillips de Pury have pulled together some impressive pieces to send under the gavel, but Sotheby's has engineered the real excitement ... with the collection of Gerhard and Anna Lenz. The Lenzes have collected art for half a century, and the Sotheby's auction will constitute the first time they've sold rather than bought. The Lenzes are putting 49 of the 600 works in their collection on the block -- and they're doing it for the kids.
On February 10, 2010, Gerhard and Anna will say goodbye to artwork by Lucio Fontana, Yves Klein and Guenther Uecker. In return for a loss that "hurts," Bloomberg News says of Gerhard, the couple is expected to pull in close to $20 million, sans commissions. Well, that's better than Tylenol for easing the pain.
Says Gerhard, "My wife and I are of an age where we must think about our estate." He continues, "We can't burden our sons with our lives -- they have their own life plans, so we are creating a bit of space."


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Now Foods, Neptune Krill Oil, 500 mg, 120 Softgels
2 people found the following review helpful
Posted by Reviewer2069149 From New Zealand on Jan 11, 2013
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5 people found the following review helpful
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2 people found the following review helpful
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I love these supplements! So, so much better than taking the fish oils for Omega-3s! More antioxidants, smaller size, no fishy burps and no gas! I'll never go back to fish oil. In addition, joint pain -- gone! Skin -- radiant! The antioxidants even took care of a few skin lesions! I'm a true believer in Krill oil!
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Changed life!
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Posted by Reviewer1183266 From New Zealand on Dec 08, 2010
Purchased at iHerb
I have noticed such a difference in my mental sharpness since taking this! Knee pain is also gone. As my mom is unable to take Krill oil because of an allergy to shellfish, I was worried I might be the same. When I first started on it, I noticed slightly irregular feeling in my joints (mostly knuckles), but my body got used to it, and I am better than ever! Ran out of Krill for a few weeks, so went back on fish oil as I waited for the iherb order to arrive. When I went back on Krill, I noticed no irregularity in my joints the second time around. Very thankful for such a great product at great price!
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Shih Tzu Puppy
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Johnson's Snuggle Pups
Member Since: December 2011
Location: Kalamazoo, Michigan
Adorable AKC Rare Chocolate/Liver
• Male • $650


text: O Sadie Stein on Jezebel Corsets Fetishes Undergarments Men in corsets Drag 1/06/09 3:40pm 1/06/09 3:40pm Edit4,458g122LEShare to KinjajFacebookiTwitterkTumblrK It's A CinchCheck out this video on corset-wearers — specifically, one guy, who says, "If you're a couple and you're both wearing a corset, it's pretty amazing." For them, perhaps. [AOL] LDiscuss


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I have recently migrated our mantis bug tracker to a new machine and upgraded in the process. Everything seemed to go smoothly and our new system is up and running. The only problem is that any old uploads are "available" though contain no data. New uploads are fine! We can upload files and then access them with no problems. We use the database as the file store. The documents are still on the old system and are available and downloadable. Might I have not exported the database correctly??
I used the commands suggested in the manual.
create backup:
mysqldump --opt -u<username> -p<password> <database name> > <backup file>
restore backup:
mysql --force -u<username> -p<password> <database name> < <backup file>
Everything else seemed to be backed up and restored correctly (projects, users, passwords, bug entries ...)
when I use the system utilities on the old machine to move attachments to disk I receive :
Found 0 attachments to be moved.
0 attachments processed, 0 failures
This does not seem correct as we have many attachments to bug entries (or am I confused as to what that utility does).
Thank you.


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Truth & Rumors > MLB
Numbers suggest Price got undeserved Cy Young
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- 12
10:42 PM ET 11.15 | David Price did not deserve this award based on stats. Price did lead AL starters in wins with 20 and ERA at 2.56, so he comes out on top in what we think of as the "old-fashioned" categories used to determine who had the better season. He did it with a good BABIP allowed and a very high strand rate, which explains part of why he lagged guys like Verlander and Felix Hernandez in varieties of WAR. I don't hold that against him and I would never advocate giving the Cy Young to a guy who lost games, let runners score and saw ball after ball drilled up the gaps. It may be hard for any great pitcher to repeat that low BABIP and great clutch pitching combo but he did do it, luck or not luck. That isn't all, though, the bigger reason that Price's WAR trailed Verlander and Hernandez by such a margin is that he did not make as many starts or pitch as deep into games -- finishing with 21 fewer innings under his belt than Hernandez and 27 1/3 fewer than Verlander. If somebody else is 99 percent as good as Price 110 percent of the time, doesn't he provide more value than Price?
Verlander was the best pitcher in either league last season.
Price was great last year, and so was Verlander. Think about this, though. Verlander got to face the Royals, Indians and Twins (plus the White Sox) in division games...while Price went through the playoff-bound Orioles, the division-winning Yankees, the Bautista-Encarnacion Jays, and the Ortiz-led Red Sox, who although they had a down year, still scored a lot of runs.
I have no problem with the voters picking Price.
Total Comments (38307)
This is such a shame. WAR for a starter??? What about ACTUAL WINS! That says it all.
They didn't want to give Trout both the ROY and MVP. They didn't want to give Detroit both the MVP and Cy Young. So they gave Trout ROY, Cabrera MVP, and Price the Cy Young. Spread out the hardware a bit.
Lets see now, winning by outscoring your opponent is the overall objective. Rewarding a guy that delivers more of those victories by keeping the opponent form scoring frequently makes perfect sense to me. He absolutely deserves the award.
They could call that one the Randy Johnson Award...bonus points for contenders with scraggly mullets and bizarrely prominent adam's apples.
That would be a good award. Add in a somewhat unpredictable personality, and you would have a pretty interesting group of winners.
If it's all about the numbers, let computers figure it out and name the awards winners. Cy Young, MVP, whatever...
Remember to keep your posts clean. Profanity will get filtered, and offensive comments will be removed.
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You're watching...
Family pleads for help to find missing soldier
Search continues for missing Ft Bragg soldier
Apr 21, 2012
You're watching...
Search continues for missing Ft Bragg soldier
Apr 21, 2012
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In one week now and police are still looking for clues into the disappearance of US army private first class Kelly Bordeaux.
She was based at Fort Bragg North Carolina and she never made it home after leaving a bar last Saturday.
Now our families pleading for help Elizabeth -- is joining us live now from Atlanta with the very latest on this investigation Elizabeth.
-- -- right it's been exactly seven days the search for Cali by Dow has been fruitless so part of -- doesn't brand new information for you.
Nicholas Colbert the bar hand the 25 year old registered sex offender has been taken into custody he turned himself in on completely -- related charges the charges.
Failure to register his new residence in the county -- -- -- with a local spokesperson he says he's being held on 100000.
Dollars secured bonds this Waller family is pleading -- public to keep her name in the news.
So they can find her alive.
It's so unimaginable to wake up every day and this is the reality.
You know.
I'm standing -- for you guys hoping that my sister is found safe and sound.
Police have turned up no leads after staging a wooded area yesterday and -- a pond in Fayetteville on Thursday the last place she was seen Saturday when that a bar called -- he bought this board knows husband wasn't in town during her disappearance and police have not named a suspect however they have questioned Nicholas Colbert that 25 year old -- I told about they have questioned him.
Twice and we know he has spoken with local media he says he gave -- ride home that evening that early morning but he has nothing to do with her disappearance.
-- sex offender status as a result of a decade old convection the conviction.
Any appropriate sexual contact with the child around the age of five that's according.
To local media reports as far as -- family is concerned they're gonna stay in Fayetteville they say they're gonna help with the search.
Until she's found alive.
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- bailouts and big big.
I believe hated being -- -- -- -- -- -- They -- say the rumors about her going it live completely untrue she took her duties as a soldier very seriously.
-- -- --
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Christian Gill burst on to the Raider football scene in a Kickoff Classic game against Milton in his sophomore year. In his first start, the defensive end recorded eight tackles and three sacks in one half of play. The Raider coaches and opponents quickly took notice.
To read more, subscribe online or pick up a copy of the July 4 Navarre Press.


text: Organisations across the board rely on Microsoft environments, whether Exchange, SQL, SharePoint or a private cloud. Supporting these environments can get tricky, especially with today's complex server, storage and network requirements.Access this three-page paper to learn about the benefits of deploying a converged storage, server and network infrastructure for your Microsoft environments. Read on to explore the unique support and improvements a converged infrastructure can deliver.


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By The News staff
Reno County Sheriff's Department is searching for the driver of a rollover car crash just before midnight. Reno County deputies responded to 82nd Street and Riverton Road for the report of a rollover accident.When deputies arrived, they found a 2002 Chevy Cavalier resting on its top next to a broken utility pole with significant damage to the car, said Capt. Wayne Baughman.
There was no driver at the scene. Despite a search of the area by District 3 Fire, Nickerson EMS, and the deputies, no one was found.
"The vehicle owner, Daniel Smith, of Hutchinson, was contacted and he advised the officers who he thought had the vehicle and attempts were made to locate that individual," Baughman said.
Area hospitals were contacted with no reports of anyone coming in that may have been involved in an accident.
The investigation revealed the vehicle was eastbound on 82nd Street just east of Riverton Road when it went into the south ditch and struck the utility pole breaking it off and causing the car to roll onto its top.
Westar Energy was on scene to replace the pole. The investigation continues with efforts to find the driver, Baughman said.