Portsmouth Community Watch Foundation, Inc.

The prize will assist us achieve a lot more than currently.  Our outreach to the youth will get a significant boost is shaping the next generation in our before school, after school, elocution, and STEEAM programs. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Environment, Performing Arts, Mathematics)

We will use some of the funds to advance a more environmentally friendly community, especially in the areas of biodiversity, energy efficiency, and climate neutrality. The prize will also assist urban households to grow backyard, rooftop, and community gardens thus earning additional income, making their abode more green and energy efficient, while improving diet. It will enhance our advocacy and program on diet and exercise towards a healthy mind and body. We will assign some funds to starting a valued added processing facility to assist women enhance their agricultural produce income by processing coconuts, fruits and other agri products into virgin coconut oil (VCO), coconut cream, guava cheese, fruit juices, and plants-based limited use utensils, etc.  These actions would be organized to be the seed from which that kind of enterprise can be expanded and be a feature of the development of our community and its neighboring agricultural villages.

I am a son of Portsmouth the second town and regional center in north of Dominica. Throughout my life I have been working to transform Portsmouth, its satellite villages and indeed the country to elevate livelihoods and improve the quality of life.

There are good possibilities for our communities if we are organized and work towards enhancing our competitive advantages.  We must be respectful to our natural environment and all our actions must be aligned with enhancing biodiversity and climate neutrality. Ultimately, our people will be the foundation on which society will be advanced.  We have to assist our youth, our women, our challenged, and indeed our communities grow holistically.

Over the years I and my organizations have assisted across the board. We have led a number of initiatives from education, youth development, health and fitness, citizens’ security, assistance to the needy, post-earthquake and hurricane recoveries, linkages with other communities and our Caribbean neighbors. Our goals for the future are based on developing in a manner that can to a large extent self-generate the funds we need to advance our communities.  While we are grateful for external assistance, ultimately we aim to organize so that we can meet our needs.

Basically we are working to improve the quality of life of our community and country.  This takes us across the board from immediate issues like health, hunger, and daily survival, to wider issues of the environment and how our actions can compromise our future wellbeing. Our programs will affect the 72,000 country population to various degrees, but ultimately, if we are successful, our program could be a model for other communities especially less developed semi-rural and those in Small Islands Developing States (SIDS).

For instance we are strong advocates of organic farming and the elimination of hazardous chemicals like Chlordecone which has cause a lot of aliments in the bananas farming communities of our neighboring islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe.  Our approach would not only avoid these kinds of catastrophic errors, but would guide the population to be enlightened and vigilant. The PCWF works across the spectrum to improve quality of life and enhance livelihoods.  We try to reduce overheads and bureaucracy to the best extent possible and to channel our resources to tangible efforts on the ground. Besides our on programs we assist others groups or entities meet goals which are consistent to our mission.

Our efforts span a wide spectrum from assisting in meals to the needy to enlightening the population on the climate emergency and the need to reduce the use of plastics in our “Skip the Bag, Save the River” anti-plastic bags campaign.  We hosted the Exxpedition women on their trans-Atlantic yacht trip highlighting the scrooge of plastics in the oceans.   Our sports, before school, and youth programs have gotten several USA university scholarships for our student-athletes, our students have been perennial finalist in schools’ debates and elocution contests, and the past three Portsmouth Secondary School Head Girls have been members of our program.  We have kept a close relationship with the indigenous Kalinagoes (Caribs), and have assisted where possible.  After Hurricane Dorian devastated the Bahamas, we connected our Secours Populaire Français partners to a sister group in the Bahamas so they could send supplies to those affected.

We have organized clean the beach campaigns while challenging those who are backfilling the wetlands which aggravates flooding and causes other environmental negatives.

On the external front, we have developed good links with organizations in Martinique and Guadeloupe, and is currently working to link Annapolis, MD to Portsmouth to develop yachting connections.

Firstly, the PCWF is grounded in the community.  We are very sensitive of the issues of the folks in the community and what can be done to assist. We try to bypass obstacles and try to minimize reliance on others who may not have the sensitivity or sense of urgency needed to resolve matters.  We have developed very good and reliable partners and focus more on getting things done than top heavy bureaucracy.   Our leadership ls selfless; we put issues of assistance as top priority while shunning personal aggrandizement or benefits. 

We are hands on, so while we do have others assist we are always aware and close to the action. We recruit others who are of the same mindset and try to avoid those looking to promote self or with incompatible agendas.  We lead from the front.  So for instance in our before school program which I lead, I try to be there every morning so the children know that the program is on and minimizes excuses.  Though we are members of the Board of Directors, our community radio, Possie Vibrations, it is run by capable folks with similar mindset and outlook.