TULSA, Ok — July 11 marks one week since catastrophic floods smashed through central Texas, leaving devastation in their wake.
Here at home, a team of volunteers is preparing to leave for Texas.
The group will be focused on property cleanup in the Sandy Creek area using heavy equipment and necessary disaster response resources.
WATCH: Tulsa volunteers head to Texas to aid in flood recovery and cleanup
Grindstone Ministries has been busy with over 50 deployments in the last five years alone.
Shannon Potts is the incident commander liaison.
“We have been deployed to the Sandy Creek area and there’s about a 19 mile stretch is what I’ve been told so far that we’ll be covering. There’s a couple of large bridges that are out that have cut off some of the communities so that’s initially where we will be starting,” said Potts.
One great resource that connects disaster survivors with volunteer organizations is the Crisis Cleanup platform.
It matches those affected by the disaster with volunteers who are ready to assist with cleanup and recovery efforts.
“So what that does for us as responders is that it creates a geolocate on a map where we can see across the board who needs tree work, or who needs their gravel replaced, things like this, and then we go out and do the work for them,” said Potts.
She said it’s a powerful way to bring help right where it’s needed most.
“People are able to report their property damage on crisis cleanup, which then generates a work ticket that all registered organizations are able to see,” said Potts.
Some of the team is already deployed and is working to meet with community leaders and the incident command structure to establish the exact needs of the flooding victims.
“Once they establish that, we will know time frames. Our team is already loading up and preparing so I would anticipate the next 24-48 hours more of our team will be deploying,” said Potts.
If you or someone you know has property damage in the Texas area, you can call the Texas Floods Property Damage Hotline at 512-201-4814.
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