Flood Relief Update

Naomi ’s Village Flood Relief Response Update

Since the massive April 29 and May 3, 2024 avalanches/floods that caused immense devastation and loss of life in rural villages around Naomi’s Village Kenya, we have been engaged daily in relief and reconstruction efforts in our community.

We formed a group of like-minded organizations that immediately sprang into action, mobilizing and deploying resources to tackle the massive challenges of traumatized communities. Families and individuals struggled to rise from the muddy remains of their broken lives and livelihoods, many grieving lost loved ones and those with severe injuries. Around 100 babies, children and adults perished. Dozens of families had everything they owned swept away within minutes by violently raging flood waters.

We spearheaded formation of a task force comprised of Christian organizations, community elders, professional volunteers and elected political leaders (for instance, the local Member of County Assembly, akin to a Congressional member) to coordinate immediate relief and subsequent restorative/rehabilitative efforts. After a brief period of government assisted rescue measures, our task force was left to deal with the remaining needs of our decimated communities. This multi-agency team formed four key committees with specific mandates to foster well-coordinated responses to these tragic events (Data Collection, Counseling, Infrastructure, and Resettlement Committees). Flood-related community efforts were guided and carried out under the leadership of these four committees.

The Data Collection Committee collected and verified data and demographic information for flood victims. At first, we had difficulty determining who was a genuine flood victim and who was not; numerous unscrupulous people were caught trying to fraudulently receive flood relief supplies and funds, though they were not victims of the tragedy. Committee members reconciled conflicting data and information by making site visits and interviewing family members and neighbors. They also tabulated the most pressing needs of each victim/family. This helped the task force to coordinate provision of food, drinking water, household implements, and furniture for resettlement. This committee also oversaw payments for medical care, surgeries at local hospitals, and burial services.

The Infrastructure Committee organized earth moving machines, supplies, and workers to rebuild roads, bridges, culverts, waterlines and other infrastructure destroyed by the avalanches. It also met with government officials to ensure their plan to rebuild uphill railway infrastructure would not jeopardize the safety and welfare of communities living downhill.

The Counseling Committee coordinated and financially supported the mobilization, housing, and work of volunteer counselors who provided trauma care to victims of these disasters.

The Resettlement Committee helped genuine victims who had lost homes and property to get resettled in safe temporary housing. It also helped rebuild homes, some on their original properties and others on newly purchased plots.

In addition to these community-focused flood responses, we also had to quickly deal with rebuilding and rehabilitation of our own Naomi’s Village properties that had been destroyed and buried under tons of mud, silt and rocks.

This report provides a summary of flood related activities we have been engaged in since May 2024. We expect to continue assisting in our community’s full recovery until the end of 2025, at a minimum.

The multi-agency flood task force meeting in our new school library

Naomi’s Village Reconstruction

Though no fatalities resulted on May 3, Flood 2 roared down the mountainside, destroying large swathes of land from Old Kijabe Township to the Trans-African Highway on the valley floor. Our newly built young men’s transition house and the center of our Naomi’s Village Children’s home campus were right in the path of this flood, which swept through and destroyed fencing and buried a large portion of our property in mud, rock, downed trees and other debris. Naomi’s Village relocated all staff and children to our school, Cornerstone Preparatory Academy, which is 5 miles away and on higher ground. We then hired large equipment to remove tons of mud and debris from our children’s home grounds. Reestablishing grade level took weeks. Hired locals helped clean up the mess, rebuilt our broken fences, and relocated our playground to a new spot. For the next month, our staff, children and several visiting volunteers from US-based Engineering Ministries International (EMI) made Cornerstone their home.

We also had to rebuild our electrical, CCTV and WiFi infrastructure, which had been damaged by the floods. Fortunately, we had access to a temporary water source, since miles of our own waterline had been swept away. Our kind neighbor and partner, Valley Light Children’s Home, provided us with free water during this entire period, enabling us to carry on with these operations until we were able to reinstate our own water supply line in July.

The Naomi’s Village restoration was a massive effort that had to be undertaken within a month, because we needed the compound ready and secure for resettlement before the scheduled reopening of our school after term break. Also, previously scheduled visiting teams needed access to our Naomi’s Village Guesthouse. We are grateful for all those who made it possible for this to be accomplished on time.

Our children’s playground, before and after restoration work

Restoration of Naomi’s Village Waterline

Our water supply comes from springs far up in the hills above Mai Mahiu. Floods swept away most of our 7-mile waterline, which had to be restored as quickly as possible. This was challenging, given that the flood had totally obliterated the topography of the area and destroyed access routes. We were however able to successfully undertake this task by hiring extra engineering staff that guided our facilities team in restoring our line. These efforts went on in tandem with the reconstruction work on campus.

Activities Facilitated by the Data Committee

Distribution of Food Packages

The data committee worked quickly and tirelessly to screen and identify victims, then provided emergency food packages to hundreds of families. They found some that had been cut off from access to any supplies for almost two months. We arranged several more food distributions in the coming months. Food packages consisting of rice, wheat flour, cooking oil, tea leaves, sugar and salt were given to hundreds of hungry families. We also provided Christmas food packages to 150 families.

Provision of Water Filters

Recognizing the bulk of the community had lost all reliable sources of water and were now dependent on flowing gully water emanating from the flood for subsistence, we joined forces with Valley Light Children’s Home to distribute water filters to 77 homes in order to prevent waterborne diseases.

Provision of Household Items and Basic Furniture to Flood Victims

Dozens of families lost homes and property and were initially hosted in classrooms in an emergency Red Cross camp established at Ngeya Girls High School, adjacent to the epicenter of Flood 1 rescue efforts. They were soon transferred to temporary housing at Prayers Beyond Boundaries, a prayer retreat center run by a prominent Kenyan evangelist. Members of our multi-agency task force later provided these families with basic household items and furniture to enable them to resettle in local rentals as we rebuilt their homes.

Our team continued caring for 33 families that were left at the P.B.B. facility after about 60 other families had already been resettled in rental units by the government. We purchased supplies for each family, including a 2-burner gas cooker, a full propane cannister, a 50-gallon water storage tank, and a table. We also provided each with household items and furniture (beds, mattresses, bed sheets, couches, chairs, water buckets, cutlery, pots and pans). Our main attention focused on resettling these 33 families, while our partners took care of the needs of others.

Distribution of cooking gas cylinders to flood victims

Medical Assistance

There were many people hospitalized with various injuries, largely arising from Flood 1. Some of them still had medical concerns after being discharged. One 14-year-old high school girl’s case was emblematic. Agnes sustained multiple fractures in both legs and was left wheelchair bound. We facilitated and funded her orthopedic surgical care at CURE, Intl. Hospital in Kijabe. She eventually resumed school after her ordeal and is now completely healed.

Provision of Unconditional Cash Transfers (UCTs)

Once the immediate needs of the 33 families whose care we adopted were met and they were resettled in temporary rental houses, we made a bold decision to provide them with unconditional cash transfers. This approach respected the dignity of families by giving them the power to determine how they would meet their own needs, rather than having us continue to make purchases for them. We allocated $750 per family over a 6-month period, starting with a $400 lump sum per family, followed by five monthly disbursements of $70. The family heads signed forms and agreed to maintain records and receipts detailing the use of these disbursed funds, partly so our ministry could study how trauma victims in our community made decisions to spend limited resources. Most of them used these funds for income-generating small business ventures, education costs for their children, medical needs, and household supplies.

Removal of Flood Debris from Community Homes and Properties

In partnership with Valley Light, we desilted dozens of neighbors’ properties and removed mud, rock and other debris, repurposing this material to reconstruct nearby roads. These efforts helped uncover fertile soil on their land so they could resume productive farming. Teams of volunteer and paid workers from various homesteads assisted us in manually undertaking this task. Some properties even required the use of earth moving equipment to restore them.

Activities of the Counseling Committee

Community Counseling Support

The counseling committee coordinated 12 volunteer counselors and community health providers (CHPs), who conducted individual and group counseling sessions to traumatized citizens in Maai Mahiu and in surrounding villages, schools and institutions. These structured programs continued for six months, from early June until the end of November 2024. The team provided Christian-based mental health services for victims, first responders, and others negatively affected by the tragedy, as well as trainings and debriefing sessions for CHPs, local pastors and other community groups. Special services were targeted to help children directly and indirectly affected by the floods. The committee funded counselors’ daily stipends, assisted them with transport and logistics, and helped find local housing for the team. By the end of their assignment in November, they had professionally interacted with over 8,000 victims and identified a smaller cohort still needing long-term psychiatric care.

Activities Headed by the Resettlement Committee

Resettling Families in Temporary Homes

Through the efforts of Naomi’s Village board member Gary Amerson’s nonprofit, GoBeHope, we settled the previously mentioned 33 families stranded at the PBB Centre into temporary rental homes. GoBeHope helped cater for their rental costs.

Reconstruction of New Houses

In partnership with Rift Valley Academy (RVA) and the local Africa Inland Church, we screened and identified 22 households in our nearby area that needed their homes rebuilt from scratch. Many of them were part of the group of 33 families whose care was assigned to us by the multi-agency task force.

These 22 houses have been completed and are now occupied by their beneficiaries. RVA staff provided most of the necessary funding for the construction of the structures, while we provided materials, labor, and oversight for finish works (in particular plaster, painting and ceiling installation). It has been extremely rewarding to rebuild these homes for families who suffered so much loss from these floods.

One of the 22 completed houses

Activities Coordinated by the Infrastructure Committee

Provision Of Fuel for Road Reconstruction

After initial government led rescue and relief efforts, the Deputy President of Kenya instructed the Kenya Defense Force (KDF) team that was spearheading these efforts not to leave Mai Mahiu before first deploying their heavy equipment (bulldozers, backhoes, graders) to ensure destroyed roads were reopened to communities that had been cut off by the floods. The main road targeted was Old Kijabe Road, which provides highway access leading to our Naomi’s Village Home campus and other nearby communities. The KDF-led team, which included National Youth Service (NYS) paramilitary workers, had equipment but no funds for fuel to handle this emergency. After learning this, we engaged their leadership and arranged to provide fuel for their planned efforts. This fuel enabled them to begin working on Old Kijabe Road, the major feeder road serving communities all the way up the mountain to Kijabe Mission Station. All road access to Old Kijabe Township had been destroyed, and its residents were now surviving on supplies that were being ziplined down to them from Kijabe Mission Station.

Members of the Infrastructure Committee attending a meeting with the KDF and County emergency response committee

However, we ran into issues when corruption reared its ugly head. We discovered through a community whistleblower that KDF equipment operators were colluding with local cartels to siphon and sell fuel from their machines to local truckers in Mai Mahiu. We immediately confronted this and terminated our KDF partnership. The KDF team subsequently withdrew their people and machines. A Chinese contractor hired by Kenya Railways (KR) to rebuild their damaged railway line then deployed equipment and finished the rebuilding of Old Kijabe Rd. Naomi’s Village flood relief funds provided $9,150 in fuel, helping facilitate the construction/reopening of this critical 8-mile access road.

KDF personnel consult with Chinese contractors, who eventually restored Old Kijabe Road.

Reconstruction of Roads and Removal of Debris from Neighboring Properties

Following the disappointment of the military-led road reconstruction effort, we decided to carry on with reconstruction of other key roads on our own. We hired our own equipment (back hoes, front-end loaders, dump trucks, road graders, and rollers) to reconstruct our own Marekia Road and neighboring AIC Ruiru Road, which provide key access to our area. As has already been highlighted above, we also deployed this heavy equipment to help clear debris from homes, farmland and other properties in our neighborhood.

Construction of Drainage Channels

The Infrastructure Committee committed to add proper drainage channels on all local roads to protect them from heavy rain runoff in the coming years. But first, to ensure we did not suffer this much devastation again from potential future landslides, we petitioned Kenya Railways (KR). We implored them not to construct any solution for their damaged railway that might prevent free flow of water from above railway embankments built uphill. Undersized pre-existing culverts had previously gotten blocked, causing massive uphill water accumulations. Subsequent earthen embankment failures and terrible landslides resulted, which we could not allow to recur. Secondly, we agreed that water flowing freely downhill during rainy seasons would follow properly designed stone drainage channels for egress safely into natural streams and rivers. Bending to public pressure from the Infrastructure Committee and other local citizen groups, KR then drew up plans for a massive uphill drainage structure sufficient enough to address our first concern. They have since deployed the aforementioned Chinese contractor to build this structure. We then completed construction of 1.5 miles of large capacity stone drainage channels along AIC Ruiru Road and Marekia Road, which we believe will protect our neighborhood from heavy water flow during rainy seasons in the future. We still have major drainage work to undertake alongside our community’s main access road, Old Kijabe Road, which is now ferrying most rainwater flowing down from the hills above Mai Mahiu.

Construction of Bridges and Culverts

Apart from the reconstruction of the roads that were destroyed by the floods, several key bridges and access culverts connecting multiple communities and villages across Maai Mahiu were totally destroyed by the floods. The Infrastructure Committee identified 5 key bridges and 6 access culverts that needed to be properly built to last. We have already completed the construction of two concrete bridges, backfilling and connecting them with the road network. We have also begun work on the installation of five key box culverts at Maai Mahiu primary school and along Old Kijabe Road.

Backfilling/compaction to connect a newly constructed concrete culvert bridge to the road.

Reinstallation of a Community Waterline

As earlier highlighted, floods destroyed water supply pipelines in the community. A large section of the population living in settlements along the Trans-African Highway lost water coming from an uphill pipeline, though their community was not directly hit. Their leaders approached us for assistance to help them restore .6 miles of their pipeline. We purchased materials and gave technical supervision, while Valley Light funded labor for this work, which has since been successfully completed. Below are before and after photos of AIC Ruiru Road restoration, as well as the waterline being reinstalled.

Summary of Expenditures – Naomi’s Village Flood Relief Efforts

Below is a summary of the expenditure on these activities as of Feb 7, 2025. (We used the current exchange rate of 129 KSH/USD). Our heartfelt gratitude goes out to all those who provided funds for these necessary activities, which will make a lasting impact to the Maai Mahiu community for years to come.

Report Prepared By: Oscar Og’wang, Director of Administration and Robert Mendonsa, CEO – Naomi’s Village, Inc. Date: Feb 17, 2025