Lay leaders consider
disaster planning

 

By Claudia M. Williams
Staff Writer
What Southwest Texas congregations should do to prepare for disasters was a major topic last month at the second—or “later”—edition of the 2006 Laity Assembly in Kingsville.
About 25 people—from the Corpus Christi, McAllen, Victoria and San Antonio districts—attended the second gathering Feb. 24-25 at First UMC, Kingsville. The first—or “sooner”—session was Feb. 17-18 at Mount Wesley Conference Center, Kerrville.
Southwest Texas Conference Lay Leader Jay Brim led the disaster-preparedness discussion in Kingsville. Other discussions during the assembly dealt with local church leadership and new church development.
In a letter to the gathering, Bishop Joel N. Martinez said that the Southwest Texas Conference area is a “zone that is characterized by the threat of hurricanes, tornados and flooding on a regular basis.”
Consequently, Brim said, congregations have a key role in preparing for disasters and responding after a disaster strikes.
“It’s a call from Jesus Christ,” he said. “Be prepared to take care of the weak and house those who need homes. That’s our biblical call, our reason for preparedness.”
Participants brainstormed ways to respond before and after a disaster. One was the partnering of churches in Gulf Coast communities with Southwest Texas congregations farther inland.
That connection would give coastal congregations a designated place to go for shelter in the event of an evacuation. The inland church would be a place where evacuated United Methodists could worship.
Some congregations have disaster plans in place, assembly participants reported. Some are beginning to put them together.
“Our church found out with Hurricane Rita that we didn’t have a plan for the church building and our homebound members,” said Kay Plummer, a member of Grace UMC, Corpus Christi. “We had boards for the windows, but who was going to put them up?
“We have a lot of shut-ins without family. Who was going to take care of them?”
Plummer said the assistance came from “whoever we could pull together.”
The 990-member congregation now has teams of people who will know in advance “what we are in line for with a hurricane,” she said. In the church’s recent stewardship campaign, church people checked on their pledge cards to indicate interest in serving in a new ministry, hurricane preparedness and emergency disaster aid.
What Grace UMC did have last fall when Hurricane Rita approached the Texas coast was a partnership with an inland church, First UMC, Sabinal.
Sabinal Pastor Don Snyder had been an associate pastor at Grace.
“When we were told to leave Corpus Christi,” said Ann McConnell, a Grace member, “the Sabinal church opened its doors for anyone from Grace. They prepared for all of these people from Don’s previous church.”
But, she said, Grace didn’t have to evacuate, and the Sabinal church offered refuge to others fleeing the hurricane.
Brim provided each attendee a couple of sample disaster plans, both for individuals and for congregations. He said the idea is for leadership in local churches to review the sample plans—“not necessarily to do them,” he said, “but look at them as an immediate need for your church.”
“Hurricane season is just around the corner,” said Jerry Wheeler from John Wesley UMC, Victoria. “We have only four months to be thinking about our plans.”