Mission teens repair Hurricane Dolly damage

By Edwina P. Garza

With the early afternoon summer sun beating against their backs, eight teenagers pounded nails onto the roof of an Edinburg home this week as part of the annual Mission Service Project.

“There’s a huge sense of satisfaction with the work,” said 17-year-old Quinten Womack, a senior at Sharyland High School.

On Tuesday, the group, along with three adults, worked on a South Trails Road home that was damaged by last July’s Hurricane Dolly winds. The home isn’t yet complete, but the work the couple had done previously was completely destroyed by the forceful winds, said Joe Vela, a leader with the group.

“Some people consider it missionary work, others say it’s a project,” Vela said Tuesday, the second day of the team’s work on the Edinburg home.

Nearly 28 years ago, the First Methodist Church started the Mission Service Project as a home repair endeavor. Over the years, the church developed partnerships with other churches in the area, including First Presbyterian Church, St. Paul’s Church, and St. Peter St. Paul Episcopal Church in Mission. In McAllen, the organization has recruited help from First United Methodist Church, Holy Spirit Catholic Church, Trinity United Methodist Church, and St. Mark’s United Methodist Church.

Students 13 and older – that have completed the eighth-grade – are invited to represent their church in the project. Along with starting work early in the morning, the team also stays together at a host church where they pray and eat their meals. The team working on the South Trails Road home was staying at St. Paul’s Church in Mission.

Along with helping construct a home, or doing remodeling work, the teenagers also learn to bond with the families they help. Vela said they are basic lessons of helping a fellow neighbor, sharing talents to help others or just to improve the general quality of life for those less fortunate.

Three families were chosen this year through the Faith Communities for Disaster Recovery. These families were chosen based on their needs.

On the Edinburg home Vela and his team worked on this week, constructing a new roof was the main project, but the group also worked on the interior of the home.

“We try to do as much as we can,” Vela said.

To fund their summer projects, students or churches they represent must pay $150, which helps cover the cost of materials and food for the work site.

“It’s like give and give some more,” Vela said. “But our parents and families are very committed to this project.”

Once the project is completed, the team and their parents often look at the end result surprised the teenagers were able to finish their mission.

Along with this Mission team, a group from Indiana, about 14, also came to assist in the MSP.

“It’s amazing how kids choose to do this and not stay at home in their air conditioned homes with their iPods and Internet,” Vela said.

Womack has been a part of the MSP team for a few years now, and says the work gives him a hands-on way to help people.

“I like helping people and giving their kids a better house than they had before,” he said.

His teammate, Kent Warren, 16, said the South Trails Road couple doesn’t have children, and the two have been offering a helping hand.

“But last year we met with the kids we helped and we played with them,” said Warren, a junior at Veterans Memorial High School.

Working on the roof – which Womack said was very steep – has been a bit stressful for Kristina Rivera, 18, who said she was fearful of being on the edges of the roof. But she and the other girls on the team said they were resourceful in being up on the roof with the boys, even at times being more successful in getting work done.

“I’ve fallen maybe six times today,” said Warren. “The girls were getting on the roof before us while we were cowering in the safe spots.”

Womack said neither he nor his teammates were affected by the wrath of Hurricane Dolly, but said it was important to help those who were affected get back on their feet. It’s better to help someone than to be at home sleeping the summer away, Warren added.

Jose Triana, 18, has worked on roofs before. His experience has helped him this year and also allows him a chance to help teach his teammates, he said.

“We get to learn all kinds of things here,” Triana said. “You learn how to do plumbing and lighting sometimes.”

The skills they learn over the summer could also be valuable to them in the future, especially as they grow up and get places of their own, team members said. What they learn here could also be applied to helping out their own families at home today, they added.

“It helps you be creative, too,” Womack said.

The gratitude and smiles from homeowners and families are all worth the sweltering days in the Rio Grande Valley sun, MSP members said.

“It’ll be nice to not have to wake up at 6 a.m., but it’s mostly about the satisfaction,” Warren said.

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We the People

Support Operation Interdependence

By Jim Brunson

KURV Radio newsman Sergio Sanchez has been beating the drum, urging Valley residents to support the troops and bring in “care packages” for the servicemen and women deployed in Iraq, Afghanistan and other locations throughout the world.

I talked to Sergio the other day, letting him know that the Progress Times fully supports the project. So, here’s my plug for Operation Interdependence.

KURV Talk Radio has teamed up with IBC Banks Valleywide to provide convenient drop off locations at any IBC Bank branch for folks to drop off their donations. The Progress Times will also accept donations at our office located at 1217 N. Conway, in Mission.

Sergio says to put store-bought, packaged items in care packages. (No home-baked items permitted.) Put the items in a quart-size bag, and the items will be delivered to the Operation Interdependence office in Houston, where they will do security checks before shipping the items to the soldiers.

Suggested items include beef jerky, disposable cameras, camper style foods, candy, CDs (blank or music), Chapstick, crackers, dental floss, dried fruit, facial tissues, fast food condiment packages, flashlights, foot powder (travel size), Girl Scout cookies, gum, hand sanitizer (travel size), holiday specific greeting cards, moist wipes, nerf toys (very small footballs, etc.), nuts, odor eaters (for boots), pencils and pens, phone cards, playing cards, powdered drink mix (non-alcoholic), razors, sardines, sheets of stationery, snacks (granola bars, etc.), tea bags, coffee packets, toiletries (travel size), toothbrushes, trail mix, travel games, travel mugs, and Vienna sausages.

The Operation Interdependence Web site stresses that food items must be manufacture sealed. Items deemed unacceptable by the inspectors will be discarded, and any suspicious items will be removed.

The deadline to donate care packages is July 3. (Get any items to the Progress Times office by July 2, so we can deliver them to KURV the next day.)

Sergio said the most important thing we can do is include a note of support and encouragement. This is what the soldiers need most from the folks back home is just to know we care for and support them. 

Monetary contributions are also welcomed and should be made payable to Operation Interdependence, the national organization that processes the items and ships them. This helps pay for the shipping costs.

Keren Gomez-Guilds, longtime Mission resident and Mission High graduate, has filed for Mission City Council, Place 1 in the special election called to fill the unexpired term of Celestino Ramirez who passed away May 18.

She has become increasingly interested in civic service and is actively involved as the secretary of the Rio Grande Valley Republican Liberty Caucus. She has represented Senate District 20 as an executive committee member at large for the Texas Republican Liberty Caucus. She also participated as an alternate delegate to the Texas GOP convention in June of 2008. In the first quarter of 2009, again representing Senate District 20, she participated in the organization of the Texas Liberty Campaign.

In her campaign announcement Gomez-Guilds said, “I am blessed to have been raised by parents who were filled with a spirit of civic service. My father, Eduardo Gomez, has set an extremely high standard for me. Among other leadership positions in the community, he is a past president of the Greater Mission Chamber of Commerce.”

In her early years, her father built homes all over Texas, eventually settling in Mission in 1989. Keren attended Bryan and O’Grady Elementary schools and Kenneth White Jr. High. 

“In 1994, I was lucky enough to be among the first students to attend the new Mission Ninth Grade Campus, which is now Veterans Memorial High School. I enjoyed my last three years of public education at Mission High School, graduating with honors in 1998,” she said.

After graduation, she immediately began studying at South Texas Community College and the University of Texas-Pan American where her favorite classes were ROTC First Aid & Marksmanship and Survival & Land Navigation.

While going to college in the Valley, she also became involved with the Mission Downtown Merchants Association which eventually saw through the expansion of parking and beautification of the downtown area as well as advocating for the relocation of the Chamber of Commerce in the downtown area.

She went on to study Mass Communications/Radio & TV Broadcasting at the University of Lindenwood in St. Charles, Missouri. At Lindenwood she pledged and helped found a charter of Sigma Alpha Iota. She became a broadcaster on the school’s radio station, which broadcasts in the St. Louis area, earning her broadcasting license, and becoming a member of the National Broadcasting Society.

She is also a member of the NRA and an avid supporter of the Second Amendment.

While in Missouri she met and married her husband Jeff Guilds, who has joined her to return to live in Mission.

Since 2006, she has been employed as an office administrator for Westfield Furniture, Inc. of Palmview and Westfield Furniture Clearance Center located in the heart of Mission’s historic downtown district. In her spare time, she enjoys working as a cook at Cocina del Caribe, the new restaurant located in Mission’s historic downtown district. 

“I would love to meet and work with those who would like to see Mission revitalized to shine as a booming beacon of hope during these hard economic times. What I’ve envisioned for Mission includes more use of the Mission Market Square, which is located just outside the Mission Chamber of Commerce, for such things as farmers markets, festival days, historic re-enactments, and just good old-fashioned family fun,” Gomez-Guilds added.

“They say that it’s all about whom you know, but I believe it is really all about those you don’t know and have yet to meet. I hope to meet and talk with the concerned citizens of the City of Mission so they may allow me to represent them while upholding my oath to serve and protect the organic document of our founding fathers known as the Constitution of these United States of America.

“I look around Mission and I thank God that he has given us a safe haven to grow and prosper. I would love to have the opportunity to give back to Mission what it has given to me. I am a young voice and a fresh new face for Mission. Hope to see you at the polls on August 22,” she concluded.

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Mission Parks hosting Josie Ayala softball camp

The Mission Parks and Recreation Department is hosting the Josie Ayala Girl’s Softball Camp June 23-24 from 6-9 p.m.

Cost of the camp is $40, which includes a t-shirt. The camp is for girl’s ages 6-16.

Josie Ayala was an instructor at the initial camp. Ayala loved the sport and passed away prematurely while on her way to the Mission Fast-Pitch Festival.

The camp will be two days of learning the proper techniques used by 6-8 teams reach the 2009 high school state playoffs. Coaches scheduled to instruct at the camp include Carlos Rodriguez, La Joya; Paul Cruz, Sharyland; Iris Iglesias, Mission; Vivian Ray, Veterans Memorial; Leslie Rodriguez, Palmview; Richard Tressler, Edinburg North; Johnny Medrano, PSJA North and Nicole Smedley, Rio Grande City.

For more information, call Jorge Chapa at the Mission Parks and Recreation office at (956) 580-8615 or 580-8762 or go by 721 N. Bryan Road in Mission.

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