Our recent National Relocation Conference in San Diego brought back some memories. A few years ago, my wife and I joined a mission from our church in Massachusetts to work with Amor Ministries, which focuses on building homes in destitute areas of Mexico.
With many others, we started out in San Diego, California, spending our first night in a hotel, and traveled to a barrio southwest of Tijuana, Mexico, to do our share in building a house from a desert campground with no plumbing nearby and no electricity (and hence, no power tools!). For one week, we lived exactly as the people in the region did, in a very spartan manner, without what we view as basic comforts in our day: no beds, no running water, no refrigeration, no clicking on a lamp to read at night. At the end of our stint, we returned to the same hotel in San Diego, showered off a week’s worth of toil, had dinner, and slept in a comfortable, clean bed before returning home. The contrast in our living conditions from one day to the next was extraordinary, and the fact that we have the choices in our lives that we do—never worrying about where we will sleep or where our next meal will come from—has never been lost on us. What seemed like a hardship to us: to live without power and plumbing, is a delight to the individuals who receive homes through Amor’s program.
This experience is similar to many stories we hear from Worldwide ERC® members. Collectively and individually, our members give from the heart across the world, over and over again. That urge to give is even more evident in recent years since we established the Foundation for Workforce Mobility, and committed one of its purposes to focus our industry’s charitable giving. Through your generosity and support of the Foundation, and your willingness to help, we have given more than $170,000 to charities in five short years, feeding the needy, supporting medical research, safeguarding and housing families, and helping to sustain a range of programs through 21 different charities to date.
But we think we can do even more. In fact, Foundation trustee Pete Wayman, SCRP, GMS, with Atlas World Group, challenged us to consider an initiative we’ve tentatively titled “Compassionate Mobility” (which you’ll read about on page 23 of this issue), through which we could marshal the talents and resources of our industry and offer, in essence, pro bono services to needy individuals. A couple of examples come to mind—the recently single parent leaving an abusive situation, who needs to relocate to be closer to family and help with childcare and a job; or a returning injured Armed Services veteran whose recovery would be supported if we were to help his family temporarily live near him during the hospitalization period. In early June, we gauged your interest in this initiative with a quick survey, and were delighted to receive more than 160 responses, many of which indicated an interest in helping someone in this fashion if it were within your capabilities or resources to do so.
Here’s what we learned: Worldwide ERC® members are most willing to give of their time, and some company resources or financial contributions would be available. Several programs or resources were identified for potential assistance if we undertake this effort, including airline frequent flyer programs which allow members to donate miles; government entities for resources, funding and potential grants; and existing member charitable foundations and local charitable organizations.
A number of our global members responded to the survey with a high degree of interest and many examples of pro bono work that have been accomplished across borders. And they want to be sure that if we move forward, the steering group will include members from the EMEA and APAC regions so that it truly embodies a global perspective.
The limitations of the current economic and relocation industry environment notwithstanding, 44 percent of the respondents suggested a start date for this initiative later this year. We’ll keep you posted on our progress.
I’ve repeated before a quote from anthropologist Margaret Mead, which seems to embody the charitable objectives of the Foundation. She said, “never believe that a few caring people can’t change the world. For, indeed, that’s all who ever have.” It’s clear that we may be moving beyond helping with a bed and a meal. We’re out to change the world.
—Kevin Rich, SCRP, CMC
2009 Chairman
Worldwide ERC® Foundation for Workforce Mobility
New World Van Lines,
Chicago, IIllinois