An event to bless the donated trailer featured a team of leaders from AHSV and HCRN, including John Schroer, Adventist Health Global mission manager (center in blue); Jennifer Swenson, AHSV president (in pink); and Taylor Laurie, AHSV director of mission and spiritual care (in green jacket).
Adventist Health Simi Valley has donated a command center trailer to the Hope Crisis Response Network that will be used as an operations center during statewide disaster response.
During the past six years, more than 1.7 million families in California have had to evacuate from their homes because of wildfires alone. When disaster strikes, life can change in an instant leaving people in need of even the most basic services — food, restrooms, showers, medical care, pet supplies, emotional support, and more.
To help during these times of crisis, HCRN mobilizes their Hope Disaster Resource Village to provide services for individuals, families and communities. Since 2015, HCRN staff and volunteers have helped communities near more than 50 major wildfires in California. HCRN will use their new command center trailer to organize and deploy equipment, volunteers and a variety of targeted resources including information technology.
A special event was held at AHSV on Aug. 11 to pray for the work of HCRN and to officially hand over the keys to the trailer, which was previously used as the hospital’s COVID-19 command center. “Our mission is to live God’s love,” said AHSV President Jennifer Swenson at the dedication event, “and I can’t think of a better way to do so than to be a part of something so meaningful.”
John Schroer, manager of the Adventist Health Global Mission department, said that facilitating connections like the one between HCRN and AHSV is one of the most rewarding parts of his job. “It’s wonderful to be able to reach out and provide a resource that will be used throughout the state to help hurting communities,” said Schroer.
Schroer’s Global Mission team works to nurture physical, mental and spiritual well-being by partnering with local communities and international health organizations. Their focus is on inspiring sustainable change, supporting community-led development, and providing opportunities for better health and access to healthcare for medically under-resourced communities. Through strategic partnerships and the power of the Adventist Health community, Global Mission works to strengthen and empower at-risk communities in order to create a better world.
— Kim Strobel is project manager: Religion, Faith and Mission, for the Office of Mission | Mission and Spiritual Care at Adventist Health.