2008-04-30 23:28:32 -

SANTA ROSA DE COPAN, HONDURAS--St. James Episcopal Members Cameron Maneese is 'changing the world one meeting at a time,' she sighs with a smile. That's how she describes her collaborative community work as Coordinator of Wayne County Family and Children First Council in Wooster, OH and volunteer work with Central American Medical Outreach, Inc. (CAMO) in Honduras.
One of several

area community leaders, Maneese welcomed Sonia to Wooster in January, and then traveled to Honduras with CAMO in February to assist in structuring a family violence shelter through a series of meetings with community leaders. The family violence shelter team met with Santa Rosa de Copan Mayor Juan Manuel Bueso to generate support for a domestic violence shelter for a region with 600,000 people and no refuge for women and children in dangerous home situations.
CAMO has employed Sonia to coordinate comprehensive community involvement in the Family Violence Shelter. Bueso is a supporter of the CAMO project.
'We met to let him know the statistics (on domestic violence in his community),' said Maneese. 'Mayor Bueso wants to see it (family violence shelter) come to fruition. We met to get his opinion, guidance, recommendations on how he thinks we should proceed. What is our next step together? With our findings, we will make a report, so he is better able to speak to community leaders once we leave.'
'When I see a team working together and sharing their knowledge with me, I call that solidaridas: ‘I'm going to be there to support you.'' said Sonia Medina, Director of the Women's Commission and Former Governor of Santa Rosa de Copan. 'The family violence shelter team from the United States was eager to show me everything and very generous with information. They have a lot of passion.'
Maneese's team met with law enforcement, Human Rights' Commission, Women's Commission, Juvenile Judge, Domestic Judge, church leaders and school officials to provide a full range of care for families. 'You need to have the right people to have the conversations and see the problem together,' explained Cameron. 'It helps to bring everyone to the table to find out what part they will play.'
Cameron emphasized the importance of prevention, education and then reaction to family violence. 'Otherwise, a shelter is just women going to safe apartments. It's not enough.'
'Many women are spending their nights at the police department or in the streets. We have to do something to help these women and their children,' said Medina.
'We had the same problems in Wooster as Santa Rosa when we started.' Maneese said of her volunteer work with CAMO in Honduras. 'We asked, ‘How do you make a community aware enough to change?' It takes years and years and years. The way we do things won't be the exact same way in Santa Rosa, but we can share the lessons learned in 30 years.'
Since 1993, CAMO has renovated the Hospital de Occidente, public health and community buildings and continually expanded to now offer 17 healthcare and community programs in Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras. CAMO cares for more than 143,000 medical needs with an average of $2 million in donated medical supplies, equipment and expertise annually. CAMO, a 501(c)3 non-profit, multiplies every $1 donated into $4.