26.  Haiti Outreach operates under a different model — a model of grassroots community participation and community ownership.

 27.  It is a model of empowerment for the people themselves to create and maintain sustainable development, not a model of dependency.

 28.  The features of this model are: One, the request for assistance comes from the people of the community to be assisted.

 29.  Haiti Outreach does not come into a community and tell them what they need; they tell us.

 30.  Two: They must be a diversified representation of the community as a whole, not just one particular organization, church or family.

 31.  Three: They must be committed to planning, organizing, and doing the work themselves for anything that they have the manpower and resources to do.

 32.  To cap a spring and dig trenches for underground pipe, for example, they must do the planning, with our guidance, and perform all the labor.

 33.  Four: They must create and implement an economically viable maintenance program.

34.  Water systems that are built are to be maintained and kept in working condition with money raised from the community.