It might seem a little strange that, according to the Torah, Israel’s God should include among the 613 commandments two concerning the disposal of human bodily waste from a military camp (Deuteronomy 23:14-15).
But concern over such seemingly vulgar and indecent matters is no joke, as Milwaukee nurse practitioner Gigi Pomerantz and members of her synagogue, Congregation Shir Hadash, can tell you.
Since 2006, Pomerantz has spent periods of time doing medical and sanitation work in the Caribbean country of Haiti.
As Pomerantz explained in an interview, 84 percent of rural Haitians have “no access to sanitation. "People deposit bodily waste just about anyplace," she said.
And the consequences are dire. The waste gets into the water and local animals eat it; and diseases thereby get spread.
In fact, 70 percent of rural Haitians have no access to clean water; and 14 percent of the children — roughly one in seven — die before the age of 5, largely because of diarrhea caused by infection from the contaminated environment, Pomerantz said.
So in March 2008, Pomerantz founded Youthaiti Inc., an organization to “support youth in Haiti in doing ecological development work,” she said.
And on May 1, the board of Shir Hadash passed a resolution stating that it is “committed to help the people of Haiti by supporting the values of Youthaiti, a program that embraces environmental protection, youth leadership development and the right of all to create a life of dignity, free from hunger and want.”
‘This looks easy’
Pomerantz said she had long wanted to perform service in a Third World country, but had originally thought about doing so in Africa.
About two years ago, a friend, Rea Katz, called Pomerantz’s attention to a medical mission organized by the St. Thomas Catholic Church of Naperville, Ill., that in February 2006 went to the village of Duchity in southern Haiti.
Travel to Haiti was cheaper than to Africa; and Pomerantz also could speak French, a vernacular in this former French colony, she said.
Over five days, Pomerantz and three other care providers in the medical mission saw 1,400 patients of all ages, Pomerantz said. “The majority had stomach complaints” which were “related to the lack of access to sanitation and clean water.”
During that time, Pomerantz read a booklet published by the Hesperian Foundation called “Sanitation and Cleanliness for a Healthy Environment.” It “described methods of ecological sanitation that could be done in the developing world,” she said.
“I thought, ‘This looks easy. Even I can do it.’”
She made inquiries and learned about SOIL (Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods), an organization that, according to its Web site (www.oursoil.org), is “dedicated to protecting soil resources, empowering communities and transforming wastes into resources in Haiti.”
One of SOIL’s founders and board members is Sasha Kramer, an ecologist and activist who has worked in Haiti since 2004, according to the Web site. Kramer invited Pomerantz to help in fundraising for the organization and to visit SOIL’s work in Haiti, which Pomerantz did in January 2007.
Pomerantz also returned to Duchity, where one of the community leaders she met, Franci Polyte, had created a group, OJPDH (a French acronym for Organization of Young Progressives for the Development of Haiti). Together, they decided they wanted to build an ecological toilet facility in a public area.
Pomerantz returned to the U.S. to raise the funds. In May 2007, she returned to Haiti with Shir Hadash congregants David Moss and his daughter Evan, and Mimi Rozansky and her son Joel. Moss is a physician and Rozansky a physical therapist, so they did medical work while their children helped build the facility.
At the village’s public grade school, Pomerantz and her team built a facility containing “dry composting toilets,” that separate liquid and solid human waste and collect them to be processed and reused as fertilizer.
Pomerantz made another trip to Haiti in December 2007-January 2008, with more Shir Hadash members, Nancy Pinter and Max Samson and their two teenage children, and Lucy Rosenberg and her two adult granddaughters.
They came to work on another of Pomerantz’s projects, the construction of an orphanage, for which the Jack and Lucy Rosenberg Foundation provided a challenge grant and Samson funded the construction of a dry composting toilets facility.
Shortly after this, SOIL informed Pomerantz that it was time for her to start her own independent organization. She therefore created Youthaiti in collaboration with OJPDH in Duchity.
However, Pomerantz said she will continue to work with SOIL; indeed, SOIL’s national coordinator in Haiti, Marcorel Lisius, is a member of Youthaiti’s board, she said.
Congregation signs on
All of this occurred during the past Sabbatical year in the Jewish calendar, which Shir Hadash has made its year to explore environmental concerns and issues and their connections to Judaism.
Pomerantz approached the synagogue’s social action committee, which recommended support for her efforts.
“We felt our responsibility extends beyond the local congregation,” said Eve Dicker-Eiseman, one of two vice presidents on the congregation’s board.
“This is an important project” that has come to involve Pomerantz and other Shir Hadash members, she added.
Pomerantz said the statement from the board might eventually lead to more concrete support efforts. “We might have a Haiti weekend. We might do a synagogue trip. Everything is possible,” she said.
Meanwhile, Pomerantz is planning to go to Haiti on July 11 with her daughter, Liat Mayer, to spend two weeks on more projects there.
When asked what she gets out of doing all this, Pomerantz replied, “I asked myself that question… The only thing I can say is that I have a sense of being called to do this work. It is a very spiritual experience. It’s almost as if I don’t have a choice.”
But she added that the Haitians with whom she has worked have deeply appreciated her efforts. “It hard to describe the amount of love you get,” she said.
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