16342: (Hermantin) Palm Beach Post-Keeping AIDS nonprofit afloat a challenge (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Sunday, August 10
Keeping AIDS nonprofit afloat a challenge


By Gariot Louima, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Sunday, August 10, 2003



BOCA RATON -- Nuella Benéche's office barely accommodates her desk, a few
chairs and a stack of donated toys.

To keep the telephone on, she scrounged together $200 this month to pay off
part of a $620 bill. Most of it is past due. Long-distance calls to New
York, Montreal and Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

"Those were calls from when we were organizing the concert," Benéche said
with a wave of a hand.

She'd prefer not to think about the concert, a fund-raising effort that put
her fledging nonprofit $4,000 in the hole.

Benéche's money woes are actually the BenJo Foundation's money woes.
Benéche, a registered nurse, started the nonprofit foundation in November to
help children afflicted with, or orphaned by, HIV and AIDS in Haiti and
Belle Glade.

She is fast learning the challenges of keeping a charitable organization
financially afloat.

Only 300 or so people showed up for the concert, and 75 of them were given
free tickets, Benéche said. The June 28 event featured popular Haitian
singers Emeline Michel and Leon Dimanche.

"People don't know us so they are afraid to support us," she said while
sitting barefoot in her office at 4400 S. Federal Highway. "They think we're
trying to get rich on the backs of little children."

Benéche hopes this isn't the case for long, as she's devoting most of her
time -- and much of her money -- to get the foundation on its feet.

Working with her brother in Haiti, Benéche is hoping to offer free medical
service to poor children in Haiti and Belle Glade.

So far, her efforts haven't yielded much fruit in Palm Beach County. But her
brother, Hugues Joseph, has already formed partnerships with Haitian doctors
who now provide medical care and prescription drugs to poor children in
Port-au-Prince for free or at very reduced rates.

"This is just the start, you know," said Benéche, who still works part-time
as a nurse. "I really want to get a clinic set up. I want a big one in Haiti
and another one in Belle Glade."

Benéche said she wants to one day focus her energies exclusively on children
affected by HIV and AIDS.

"The need is very great," Benéche said. "There are other organizations to
help children, but the misery in Haiti is so awful there still isn't
enough."

Haiti is the Western Hemisphere's poorest country. It is fraught with
political and economic problems that have devastated the country's
infrastructure.

Sixty-five percent of the country lives in abject poverty, according to
United States Agency for International Development. Only 25 percent of the
nation's children are vaccinated.

The result, pediatrician Jean Joseph Règis said, is children in poorer
neighborhoods are exposed to infections at alarming rates.

"We see a lot of children with pneumonia, gastroenteritis, diarrhea, TB,
upper respiratory problems and malnutrition," said Règis, who works with
BenJo.

Règis said he also sees a lot of children with AIDS. Haiti's population is a
little more than 7 million, according to the Haitian Embassy in Washington,,
and more than 250,000 people -- including 11,800 children -- are infected
with AIDS.

Every other weekend, Règis and his business partner Dr. Lyonel Allen set up
a makeshift clinic in a neighborhood school.

Règis asks parents to pay what amounts to about 50 cents for treatment and
prescription drugs. "If we advertised that we weren't charging anything," he
said, "we'd be treating people all night."

Normally, a visit to the doctor could be about $12, he said.

Benéche concedes that laying the groundwork has been tiring. Most months,
the foundation's bills are paid before her own.

"It takes a lot of sacrifices. I guess if you really believe in something,
you have to work for it, you know," she said. "If I didn't really believe in
BenJo's mission, I wouldn't put everything I have into it."

Once BenJo is off the ground and has enough money to pay a director, Benéche
said she'd prefer to be its secretary.

She's flying to Port-au-Prince this weekend, one of many trips she'll take
in the coming year to the country of her birth.

She's also going to participate in a health fair in Petit-Goave, a small
village southwest of the Haitian capital. The two-day medical mission,
organized by West Palm Beach Dr. Jean Monice, is expected to draw 2,000.

Then she'll meet with physicians at the general hospital and distribute toys
to children in the pediatric ward.

She examined her cramped office space, surveyed a desk she purchased
secondhand for $20, piled high with business cards and documents.

"We'll touch some lives," she said. "This will grow."

gariot_louima@pbpost.com

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