Kentucky churches, communities work together to meet flood victims’ needs

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Lori Helfrich, the parish life director at Mother of Good Counsel Church in Hazard County, Kentucky, had just come from volunteering at the food pantry that her parish helps support.

They were cutting up melons to distribute to people hit hard by the torrential rain and flooding that has followed in the southeastern region of the state.

“Northfork Local Foods (the food pantry Hazard’s parish is part of) has a lot of melon and is distributing it so people have some fresh food,” Helfrich said in a mid-afternoon conference call July 29 arranged by the Diocese of Lexington, Kentucky.

“A lot of people don’t have water and electric. As community partners and churches, that’s what we’re working on — trying to connect people where we can,” she said.

The rains began late July 27 and went into the next day, causing massive flooding that destroyed hundreds of homes and wiped out entire communities, according to news reports.

Search and rescue teams, with the help of the National Guard, began searching for missing people July 29. As of Aug. 1, 660 air rescues and hundreds of boat rescues had been conducted.

By mid-morning Aug. 2, the death toll had reached at least 37 people, with more than a hundred still missing.

The chances that more storms would hit the region were diminishing, but residents and rescuers were facing extreme temperatures instead.

On the conference call, Helfrich said that besides Hazard County, which has a population of about 5,000, she has the most contact with Letcher, Knott, Perry, Owsley and Breathitt counties. Of the 65 Catholic families in Hazard, at least one family has lost everything, she said.

“Today the concentrated effort is on those who are still missing,” she said. A lot of the flooding came at night while people were sleeping. You compound the flooding with high poverty rates and you end up with the perfect storm.”

She said that debris in the flood water and the numbers of roads washed away are making it hard for first responders to reach people. And communication is spotty.

“To be able to get to people is hard. The roads — 25 to 30 feet of road — are just gone,” Helfrich said.

Gauging the devastation based on how it has impacted Catholic families isn’t a good measure because they make up less than 1% of the population in Eastern Kentucky, according to Helfrich.

But the Catholic Church works closely with community partners and is an important part of the community.

“In some cases, like Campton, the Catholic Church has the only food pantry and they feed 300 people a month,” she said. “In Hazard, we have an emergency food pantry. We work with the housing development alliance. We work with community partners — that’s how it runs. Parishes work with partners to provide outreach.”

“People are very happy that we are checking in on people and they’ll get back to you when they can. Phone reception is very spotty,” she said. “(Of) the people I’ve talked to from the parish, one lady has been devastated, she has faced a lot of tough situations in her life and this is the worst. It’s kind of overwhelming in a sense.”