The Oklahoma and Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conferences are distributing health kits and local personnel are now in place for long term recovery from the tornadoes. In La Junta, Colorado, UMCOR disaster workers have led a door-to-door assessment to determine needs following recent flooding. In Kansas, interfaith recovery groups are actively involved in the recovery process following the tornadoes there. Flood relief efforts in Fredericktown, Missouri continue, with additional assistance available when eligibility is determined for the survivors. UMCOR has disaster response personnel at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota following the tornado that hit Oglala last weekend. UMCOR staff, consultants, and volunteers are assessing the damage to determine the recovery process. Please join in the recovery work by giving to UMCOR's Domestic Disaster Response, #901670-1 and to UMCOR's Spring Storms '99, Advance #901415-4. Give through your local United Methodist Church or call (800) 554-8583 to make a credit card donation.

Volunteers are needed for ongoing recovery work from Hurricane Mitch in Central America and in Oklahoma and Kansas for clean-up, debris removal and rebuilding work following the tornadoes. Please call the UMCOR Volunteer Line at (800) 918-3100 if you can help.

Given the changing situation in the Balkans, UMCOR is assessing ways to assist and monitor the return process for Kosovar refugees and is working with UNHCR to establish lead roles in various parts of Kosovo. Current relief efforts for Kosovar refugees include the provision of packaged and bulk foods as well as local produce to refugees and host families in Macedonia. UMCOR has worked through the Food Resource Bank to provide this food as well as seeds for vegetable gardens. UMCOR continues to construct and administer camps in the region, and is working with its ecumenical partner, ACT (Action by Churches Together), to provide food, health kits, school kits, pharmaceuticals, and other relief items to the refugees. Please continue your support of UMCOR's International Disaster Response, #982450-8 in this ongoing crisis.

UMCOR is continuing to assign Kosovar refugees cases where churches (in areas where CWS/UMCOR can resettle refugees) are ready to sponsor. Local congregations are urged to consider sponsorship and co-sponsorship needed for families from Kosovo and from Africa. For further information please see the UMCOR website at {http://gbgm-umc.org/global/refugees/resettle.html} or contact UMCOR's refugee office at 212-870-3807, fax: 212-870-3624.

Annual Conference Session Contributions:

• Minnesota Annual Conference raised $38,000 towards providing for uprooted people
• Alabama West Florida Conference $17,000 plus $300,000 matching grant
• Oklahoma Conference contributed $6,000 towards tornado recovery
• West Michigan contributed $138,000 toward the resettlement of a refugee family
• Missouri-West Conference collected $1,680.00 towards tornado recovery.
• Florida Annual Conference -1000 flood buckets for Missouri flood
• Little Rock (2006) and North Arkansas Annual Conference (2,600) school kits for Mozambique which will be sent to Sager-Brown for distribution.

Give through your local United Methodist Church or call (800) 554-8583 to make a credit card donation.

Please pray for those who suffer from war, natural disasters, hunger and poverty.

   UMCOR Hotline:
   Phone: 1-800-841-1235
   Web: http://gbgm-umc.org/UMCOR-Hotline/