Rotary Grant Helps Fund YMCA Improvements In Dominican

ORLEANS – This fall, a newly renovated YMCA in a small village in the Dominican Republic will be set to fully reopen to the community, thanks in no small part to the Nauset Rotary Club.

The club is nearing its goal of raising $10,000 for improvements to the building, which the Dominican government has reopened for operation as a preschool for children between the ages of 2 and 5.

“Over the Nauset Rotary Club’s 83-year history, the club has established an impactful legacy of service to local Outer Cape Cod communities, as well as global projects — notable among them the Rotary International initiative to eradicate polio worldwide,” Jon Leonard, the Nauset club’s president, said in a statement. “The opportunity to leverage the club’s Good Works Fund to improve the lives of children in one of the hemisphere’s most economically-challenged regions is very gratifying.”

Nauset Rotary is partnering on the project with the Falk Foundation for Education, whose founder, Jennifer Falk, has been making annual trips to the Dominican with her husband since 2011. Her father-in-law has ties to the YMCA in Hartford, Conn., which in turn has a sister relationship with the YMCA in Santo Domingo. Through that connection, Falk has helped fix and refurbish homes in and around the Dominican capital, many of which have been destroyed in past hurricanes and storms.

“It’s been wonderful to see over the last 10 or 11 years the changes in the village in general in terms of the improvements,” said Falk, an Eastham resident. “Between several different groups we’ve rebuilt 30 to 35 homes in this area that now have cinder block, cement floors and roofs that don’t leak.”

But her time in the Dominican also raised Falk’s awareness about the country’s other pressing needs, including those on the education front. In 2013, she founded the Falk Foundation as a way to raise money for education programs in the country. The foundation offers funding and grants for the purchase of textbooks and other supplies for YMCAs and schools in the Dominican.

Falk said her connections with local YMCA officials in the Dominican have also grown over the years. On her most recent trip in May, she was approached by Andres Fortunato, CEO of YMCA National, with the opportunity to help renovate an inactive YMCA building in Don Gregorio, a small village on the country’s southern shore.

“He said ‘I need some money to do some renovations.’ So I said ‘Alright, let’s see what we can do,’” she said.

Nauset Rotary, of which Falk is a member, quickly got behind the effort, making a $5,000 donation to the Falk Foundation to go toward the necessary work, which includes putting up dividing walls between classrooms, installing a pump to provide potable water and the construction of boys and girls bathrooms. The club also “challenged” local organizations and private citizens to chip in to match its $5,000 donation. Falk said to date, between $8,500 and $9,000 has been raised in total toward the overall $10,000 goal.

“Rotary is an international organization,” said Robert Tucker, a member of the local rotary club. “They like people getting involved internationally on some sort of level. We’ve always mostly focused on local service projects and fundraising. People might say ‘Well, why are you doing this international thing when so many things are needed here on the Cape?’ Well, we do that, too.”

The Dominican government has made a significant investment in building and rehabbing schools in recent years, Falk said. In Don Gregorio, the government will provide two meals a day for children, outfit the building with furniture and materials and pay staff to run the programming.

The preschool program reopened in October, but Falk said participation is expected to jump from 120 children currently to as many as 300 children in September, when the YMCA building is due to fully reopen.

Falk said the revitalized preschool program will not only benefit the young children who take part in it, but also their parents, many of whom Falk has known since they were young children themselves.

“Now because they have options for putting their kids in preschool, they can get some more education or get a job or learn a trade,” she said.

And the YMCA project could be just the start of the rotary club’s relationship with the Dominican Republic. The club is exploring the possibility of applying for a global grant to help fund a project to bring fresh water to local villages. Tucker said the larger global grants could award about $30,000 for the effort, but the club is still weighing whether or not to apply.

For Falk, her work in the Dominican has been a grounding experience. Whenever she returns, she said, she’s warmly greeted by the many people she has helped over the years that she said have become extended family. That gratitude is something she takes back with her everytime she returns to the Cape, she said.

“It’s so important to realize what you really need in order to have joy in your life,” she said.

Email Ryan Bray at ryan@capecodchronicle.com