October 29, 2007

Press Release

For Immediate Release

Re: Volunteer emergency housing for victims of San Diego Wildfires

What: Launch of new web site (www.homematching.org) to match California volunteers providing housing with victims of S. Cal. Wildfires

Contact: Larry Goldberg (707-845-7272; larry@northcoast.com) or Mary Crumley, President Rotary Club of Southwest Rotary (707-442-3333; maryjpgr@suddenlink.net)

A group of Rotarians and concerned citizens of Humboldt Co. (North Coast California) have developed a web site offering temporary emergency housing for people suffering from loss of their homes and apartments in San Diego County.

“This exemplifies the spirit of Rotary. We see a need and fill it in the spirit of ‘service above self’,” said Mary Crumley, President of the Rotary Club of Southwest Eureka (http://www.swrotary.org).

“I just saw a need to help individuals and families who have suffered through this terrible disaster and we want to provide citizen-to-citizen help” said Larry Goldberg, a private IT and business consultant. As a member of the Rotary Club of Southwest Eureka and a member of the Redwood Technology Consortium, he networked his business contacts to create a rapid response to this crisis.”

The concept behind this website was based on community efforts in Texas which came out of Hurricane Katrina, but no similar website was found for this situation, so a new site was developed and launched within 24 hours from it’s conception on October 25^th.

This service is open to all concerned citizens so anyone can log onto http://www.homematching.org and provide housing or request temporary housing if they’ve been displaced by the wildfires of San Diego. This is a citizen-to-citizen effort matching people offering temporary housing with people who are victims of the wildfires of San Diego. All information is kept confidential and only people providing housing are provided match information, assuring privacy to all volunteers providing temporary housing.

The authors of this website are Josh Koenig (of Chapter Three websites, www.chapterthreellc.com) and site design and graphics provided by Matt Koglin (of Antinomia, www.antinomia.com), Michael Welch (Redwood Alliance and Climate Action Project, www.redwoodalliance.org) and photograph by Erik Saulietis (masterlatvia@gmail.com). For more information, contact Larry Goldberg (707-845-7272, larry@northcoast.com) or Mary Crumley (707-442-3333; maryjpgr@suddenlink.net), President of the Rotary Club of Southwest Eureka (www.swrotary.org).

To learn more about Rotary, go to http://www.rotary.org