Lending a hand: Dalton volunteers help clean up after Hurricane Idalia | Local News

When Dalton resident Jim Boyd heard about the devastation Hurricane Idalia dealt to South Georgia he knew there would be a lot of work ahead.

So Boyd assembled a group of volunteers and gathered equipment and made a five-hour drive to Valdosta on Aug. 31, where the volunteers began helping with relief efforts such as clearing roadways of fallen trees and home repairs.

Boyd with his wife Cheri spearheads Rebuilding Hope Ministries in Dalton.

The ministry was started in 2007 when the Boyds moved to Dalton from Minnesota. Their website states their disaster relief program is typically an “ideal fit for smaller communities and overlooked areas.”

“I’d say we spend 85% of our services helping locally in Whitfield and Murray County, helping with home repairs and other jobs, while the other 15% is spent with disaster relief,” said Jim Boyd. “I think we’ve worked on over 1,000 houses since we started 16 years ago and have probably responded to about 35 disasters.”

One of the disasters Rebuilding Hope Ministries swiftly responded to was the 2011 Ringgold tornado.

“That was probably one of the biggest ones,” he said. “It was pretty bad. We ended up not only doing disaster relief, but also rebuilding houses.”

Boyd said similarly to Ringgold, the damage Idalia caused to Valdosta will take time to address.

“We hope to stay down here for at least two weeks,” Boyd told the Dalton Daily Citizen on Sept. 8. “Lots of roads were blocked after the storms and you just couldn’t get through. There were so many trees on houses.”

The decision

Boyd said the ministry chose Valdosta as its destination because of the immense damage Idalia caused.

“We really weren’t seeing a lot of media coverage about Valdosta, so we weren’t quite sure what to expect,” he said. “I had been on a conference call and I had heard that the mayor (of Valdosta) had said they had a thousand trees down on the roads. That’s when we decided we needed to come down.”

President Joe Biden approved a disaster declaration for Lowndes County, where Valdosta is located, on Sept. 7. Lowndes County experienced the brunt of the damage in Georgia from Idalia, with “estimates showing over 80 homes destroyed and 835 homes sustaining major damage as winds reached nearly 70 mph,” the Associated Press said.

“I had contacted a friend and a pastor that had some connections to Valdosta, and they told me that (the area) got hit pretty hard,” Boyd said. “So once we got down here, I found some local people to connect with and found a couple of churches that we could partner with.”

Boyd said the outpouring of support from other communities and churches has been astounding.

“Two churches in Valdosta in particular have been such a great help to us,” Boyd said. “Redeemer Presbyterian Church opened up their doors to us and have provided us with a place to stay while Perimeter Road Baptist Church has supplied us with meals and a list of people in the area who needed the most help. It’s kind of neat how we’re able to see different churches and ministries coming together.”

He said there were volunteers from all over the country showing up to help.

“We’ve also connected with Southern Baptist (Convention) Disaster Relief and God’s Pit Crew (out of Danville, Virginia). There’s been a great network of churches and different ministries of people getting together. We’ve been coordinating with local emergency management officials as well.”

Tony Helton, owner of Helton Home Improvement LLC in Dalton, has volunteered with Rebuilding Hope Ministries on-and-off since 2010. He said he initially thought he would not be able to make the trek down south.

“Jim (Boyd) called me the first day and asked if I would be able to come down,” Helton said. “At the time, I had a prior commitment with my main job that I couldn’t really walk away from. I was working on someone’s house, and it ended up being a bigger issue than they originally anticipated, so they had to get in touch with their insurance before I could continue. That opened the door for me to make the trip.”

Helton said he has been positively impacted by the impressions made on people in need by Rebuilding Hope Ministries and their volunteers.

“The reaction that homeowners and residents have while they’re in these stressful situations and seeing how we are able to step into their lives seemingly out of the blue and help meet their needs, it’s rewarding,” he said.

The action

While in Valdosta, Boyd said volunteers with Rebuilding Hope Ministries and other Dalton volunteers pitched in to help wherever they could.

“We’ve been doing mostly tree work, although we have done some electrical work and help(ed) people do some repair to their houses and get their power turned back on,” Boyd said. “Primarily we’ve been doing tree work that requires equipment to do it. We’ve got a cherry picker so we were able to get trees off of houses and do some of the more complicated projects that other groups aren’t able to do as much. We also own a Bobcat skid steer and one of our volunteers brought another one with him, so we’ve got two.”

Boyd said several volunteers from Dalton have helped with clearing trees and debris.

“We’ve probably had at least 15 or so volunteers come down here to help us,” he said. “Some from Rebuilding Hope, but a lot of them have come from Rock Bridge Community Church as well.”

One of the volunteers from Rock Bridge, Marti Martel, participated in Rebuilding Hope’s disaster relief efforts for the first time during the Valdosta cleanup.

“Rock Bridge had announced that they were looking for volunteers for disaster relief, so I signed up,” Martel said. “Jim Boyd is connected with the disaster relief crew at Rock Bridge, so they called me and asked if I would be available. I said ‘Yes.'”

Martel said she had personal reasons for wanting to help.

“I am a cancer survivor,” she said. “I had stage three colon cancer and the Lord blessed me with a second chance on life, so I really wanted the chance to give back. I want to be able to help others as much as I can.”

When Martel arrived at a site, she said the scene left her amazed.

“I do not know how everyone is going to pick up all the trees that are down when it is all said and done,” she said. “Roads are just lined with huge tree trunks and debris. Too many to count.”

Martel said although she was only able to volunteer for a few days, much progress was made.

“While I was there we had four calls that were very important,” she said. “People had trees on top of homes, but (Boyd) is a master with his lift and skid steer. It was hard work on some hot days, but it was amazing how many different churches helped out. Even different denominations were helping each other.”

Asked if the volunteer project was rewarding, Martel’s answer was simple.

“Absolutely,” she said. “I would do it again.”

The goal

Boyd said the main goal for the relief efforts in Valdosta, as well as Rebuilding Hope Ministries, is to “help people.”

“We just want to help people and show them the love of Jesus through the work that we do,” he said. “We’re called to love the poor, so when we come to these disaster areas, we’re usually looking for those that are uninsured or under-insured and have no means of taking care of the needs that they have. We helped a lady this week who had been told it would be $15,000 to take this tree off of her house from a tree company. We were able to come in and say ‘No, we’ll do that for free.’ It’s so fulfilling for us to just see the look on peoples’ faces when we tell them there’s no charge for what we do.”

In many instances, people might have a hard time believing him, said Boyd.

“Some people are always a little skeptical when it comes to that but we assure them we’re not going to send them a bill,” he said. “We tell them we’re just doing this to share the love of Jesus with them.”

Boyd said there are always people in need and more help is always welcome.

“We’re always looking for more volunteers to help locally and to travel with us on disaster trips,” he said.

Boyd said anyone interested in volunteering with Rebuilding Hope Ministries can submit a volunteer form by visiting www.rebuildinghopeministries.org.