We Were Honored — and Called to Keep Going

Viles, Rose-Thamar, and Lindsay accept the President’s Award for Innovative Practices from the Ohio Conference on Community Development this week in Columbus.

This week, the Haitian Support Center was honored with the President’s Award for Innovative Practices by the Ohio Conference on Community Development. My colleagues Rose-Thamar, Lindsay, and I accepted the award on behalf of our entire community — those we serve and those, like you, who walk alongside us.

The award recognizes creative and lasting efforts to serve our communities — and I hope it serves as a reflection of our collective work, especially during difficult times. Because much of what we do at the Center happens when people are at their most vulnerable, when support is not just helpful, but necessary.

Just a day before we accepted this recognition, a local manufacturer called the office. The HR director was in tears. She couldn’t bring herself to tell 25 Haitian workers they were being laid off. Not because of performance — but because the Trump administration had revoked their work authorization. She asked us to come.

So we did.

That day in the factory, many workers wept — women and men alike. They’d worked hard for over a year, building lives here, sending money home. And now, just as school fees are due in Haiti, their incomes are gone. We wept too.

We can’t undo that pain, but we can respond. The Center is organizing emergency food distributions and utility assistance for those affected.

And we’re able to do this because of you.

Your solidarity gives us courage and strength — and helps us keep going when the heartbreak feels like too much.

With all my gratitude,

Viles Dorsainvil
Co-Founder and Executive Director | Haitian Support Center