Patrick Raycraft
Devastation and Generosty in Puerto Rico
Patrick Raycraft, a photographer for the Hartford Courant, was introduced by brother Joe. Patrick was a Peace Corps volunteer in 2005 in the Dominican republic. His focus at the newspaper is on the Latino community. He lives in Frog Hollow in Hartford.
In November 2017 Patrick and Vinny Vella, a reporter for the Courant, accompanied a group of four men from Hoffman Audi in East Hartford for a trip to take relief supplies to family and friends in Puerto Rico. According to Patrick, the trip was eight days of "Service above Self." The four men (Eliot Matos, brothers Jimmy and David Velasquez, and Joan Ortiz) work for Hoffman and convinced the company to allow a drive to collect donations for Puerto Rico which was devastated by Hurricane Maria. They collected donations at many auto dealerships in the area and collected enough to fill two shipping containers. These went by train to Jacksonville, FL, and then on a freighter to Puerto Rico. The supplies in the containers were intended for family members of Hoffman employees which represent a significant Puerto Rican contingent.
There are 72 municipalities in Puerto Rico, and Patrick thinks they hit almost all of these municipalities to deliver aid, since Hoffman's employees have family spread across all of Puerto Rico. However, the goods were given to families in need who were not necessarily families related to Hoffman employees, because there was so much need. Eliot Matos, the leader of the group, has a brother in law, George Ayala, in the furniture business who was able to donate the use of vehicles to deliver the goods. The base of operations was his furniture warehouse. As it turned out, the place that Patrick and Vinny had reserved had no water or electricity, so they joined the crew in staying with George. They usually had a good breakfast before they went out for a long day. One day they were out by 7:00 and did not return until the next morning at 9:00. Fortunately the gas stations were open, but the roads were terrible. And the group didn't always know how to get to the remote locations, so they needed help.
The crew is giving a generator to a woman who is a taxi driver in Puerto Rico and helped them find some of the locations of family members. Since some of the addresses were in high crime neighborhoods, the crew was appreciative of her help. This was especially important when families were suspicious of the visitors and needed reassurance that they were truly there to help.They discovered that the woman's husband needed a ventilator which required power. She had been powering it with her vehicle. The generator would now make this unnecessary. In addition to delivering generators to a number of families, they took water and water filtration systems, which were essential, since most of the water facilities in the country had been destroyed.
The logo above with the Puerto Rican flag was created to show that Connecticut and Puerto Rico are similar in side although so different in resources. The Courant ran a multipart series about the trip, which is a reminder of the level of devastation and the amount of need still in the country. The series can be found at www.courant.com/puertorico. The damage isn't so obvious froman airplane, but on the ground the devastation is still apparent.