We have an amazing community here in Ventura County!
Quick links:
- Mask-making for VC health care workers (now at 3012 of 3500 needed!): here
- Volunteer opportunities, including those for healthcare workers, in Ventura County: here.
- Want to be part of the new Gown Brigade? Go here.
Today’s update:
(Information below from Amy Towner, CEO – Health Care Foundation for Ventura County.)
Wednesday, the VC Reporter wrote about all of you and the incredible grassroots efforts in protecting our community. These measures seem to be flattening the curve more than in other regions by us staying home and taking simple precautions like social distancing, washing our hands, not touching our face and protecting ourselves if out in public. Below is the article highlighting several of you!!!
https://vcreporter.com/2020/04/answering-the-call-residents-mobilize-to-protect-frontline-workers/
Baby Monitors are doing much better and I think we can let off the gas petal getting those.
Isolation Gowns: We are still working on getting isolation gowns and may need to go into production on making the old school cloth surgical gowns but we will see once we have exhausted the sourcing. AS mentioned, when this is done, the monitors will be sanitized and given to low income mothers who would not otherwise be able to afford a baby monitor.
Gown Brigade: School Districts are leaning in with 55 gallon bags for alternative PPE and we have a team of volunteers working to assemble the roster, logistics of bag distribution and the new construction design. 55 Gallon trash bags are impossible to find in quantities that we need.
- Want to be part of the new Gown Brigade? Go here.
PPE Donations: Round of applause for Oak Park Unified School District for gloves and alternative PPE materials! Saving lives on a grassroots level in the 805!!!! Thank you Brendan Callahan for driving it to VCMC!
Places for our health care workers to rest: Today, Heidi (and Mike) Whitcomb of Ventura Rentals and original Baby Brigade member bought 12 dorm style refrigerators for the rooms Roxanne Packham set up for the doctors and nurses inside the hospital.
The Family Justice Center across the street has offered 6 rooms to our staff if we can get them furnished so they have a team working on trying to source items for that (beds, sheets, pillows, lamps, bedside tables, picture, decorative item). These rooms after COVID would be utilized by sex-trafficked individuals as a safe house. Mike Jump from the DA’s office and the Coalition are working to try and get those available as well.
More equipment!: We needed 35 stainless steel carts for outside overflow rooms ASAP. Unfortunately, no sourcing in a timely way. Ventura Unified School District to the rescue! A big thank you to Roger Rice and his team who gathered 35 carts from their kitchen that we could borrow while school is suspended temporarily. It’s a grassroots community effort where we have been forced to be creative and lean on each other in unprecedented times. Big thank you VUSD, Roger Rice, Sabrena Rodriguez, Bill Elsenbaumer and the team in Child Nitrotion Services. Stan Mantooth and more…
Keeping our front line fed!: Our community donated money to their favorite restaurant @thenaturesgrill so they could issue gift certificates to healthcare workers and to help keep business going in our community. The circle effect all while social distancing! Thank you Ventura County and Nature’s Grill, Ventura!!!
The Ventura Sandwich Company came with a stack of gift certificates for our healthcare workers. The patrons of the restaurants have donated money to their favorite restaurant to provide these gift certificates, which supports them in this downturn. These made meals help the workers and the families during this time. Today, Ventura Sandwich shops had customers write their names on them and a message of thanks from the donor. It was very touching. Love the way our community is closing the circle on nurturing one another!
Thank you United Airlines for driving the first class snacks to Ventura County! Sustenance for our healthcare workers! Also, a special thank you to Melinda Yee Franklin for connecting us to all the right people to bring this to fruition. Pictured is Alex Jose, VCMC Dietary Manager and United Airlines driver and the two are social distancing. #UnitedTogether — at Ventura County Medical Center.
Update on the mask-makers: Big thank you’s to Marty Robinson for helping with Sewing Brigade and Karen Norman is going to sew and transfer fabric supply over to Marty with her team dubbed Sew 4 Life. Also, big thank you to Nancy Phillips for helping me with the Gown Brigade and getting that project underway as well as donating a dorm fridge too!
This entire experience has taught us a lot about our world. In a pandemic, money can’t buy everything. These sewn masks and grassroot efforts to be creative and resourceful to protect our county is priceless. Thank you for your willingness to step in to a proactive role to help support the men and women who will help us in our greatest hours of need. We hope that our social distancing is helping flatten the curve. We definitely have 805 spirit!!!
- How to participate in the mask for VC health care workers: here
Follow us on this journey: If you are on social media please follow Health Care Foundation for Ventura County on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Linked In to stay connected. This is an inexpensive way for us to disseminate information and news.
How to donate: Some of you have asked for ways to donate other than these methods and that can be through the Health Care Foundation For Ventura County at www.hcfvc.org via credit card.
We are building momentum to reach our goal. Thank you for continuing to bring out the best in our community at a very difficult time. Stronger together!!!
Thank you! – Amy Towner, CEO – Health Care Foundation for Ventura County.
INDIVISIBLE VENTURA 