Like most Jamaican-Americans in the Broward County city of Lauderhill this week, Mayor Denise Grant is multi-tasking.
As Grant oversaw the collection of canned food and other relief supplies in the lobby of Lauderhill's city hall on Thursday, she was also on her phone trying to make contact with anyone back in her native Manchester Parish in Jamaica.
Manchester, like Jamaica's other central and western parishes, felt the fury of Hurricane Melissa — a Category 5 monster that was the most powerful recorded storm to ever hit the Caribbean island nation.
Melissa packed winds of 185 mph and more than 30 inches of rain when it made landfall Tuesday and plowed from the south to north coasts.
READ MORE: Storm-steeled Jamaicans brave Melissa — the strongest hurricane in their history
As of Friday morning, the hurricane death toll in Jamaica was at least 19.
As of Thursday afternoon, phone and internet connection was still down across Jamaica's affected areas. But after multiple tries, Grant finally got through to Garfield Green, Manchester's custos, or chief magistrate.
"The damage was not as bad here as the parishes to the west of us," Green assured her.
"St. Elizabeth, Westmoreland, Trelawny," he said, "we have seen total devastation. We have communities there that are completely flattened."
Green's assessment turned Grant's attention back to the urgency of Lauderhill's hurricane aid drive.
"There is a lot of fear, because a lot of persons are unable to reach their loved ones" inside Jamaica, Grant told WLRN.
"And so that makes it more important for them to make sure that [relief] supplies are going to the people that truly need it."
Lauderhill Commissioner John Hodgson, who has family in Trelawny Parish, is one of those who, as of Thursday, was still unable to reach loved ones.
"I spoke to my siblings there the night before the hurricane, but I've not heard from them since and — I don't know," he said, as he helped moved a large cardboard carton of baby diapers.
"I'm confident they're OK because they took good precautions," Hodgson said. "But I've seen pictures of the [hurricane] damage. Jamaicans are very resilient, but this is something totally different.
"It's rather shocking, to be honest."
Karen Pitter, a radiology technician in Lauderhill, shook her head nearby as she watched video that had just been sent to her phone of flooding and mudslides that occurred even near Jamaica's capital, Kingston, in the country's less affected east.
It was, however, the situation of her relatives on the other end of the island, in the west-coast tourist resort town of Negril, that had Pitter most worried.
"Our family has a house there that I'm told was completely demolished" by Melissa's 17-foot storm surge, Pitter said.
Fortunately, she added, she's certain no one was in the house when the hurricane tore through. But its destruction brought the larger picture of Jamaica's devastation into relief for her.
"I am quite concerned because tourism is our major industry, and when you look at how badly [important resort] sites like Montego Bay were hit in this storm — that part of our economy looks completely wiped out."
Mayor Grant concurred that Jamaica's post-Melissa recovery and reconstruction "is going to be a giant task and it's going to take years for the island to come back."
Which is why, she said, a big part of Lauderhill's relief drive will include not just short-term aid like food and water but longer-term help such as larger financial donations "for zinc and lumber and other critical building materials."
Lauderhill is coordinating its relief campaign with the Jamaican consulate in Miami, as well as local parks and businesses, like the Caribbean restaurant Joy's Roti Delight, and nonprofits including Food for the Poor in Coconut Creek.
The city is asking for mostly non-perishable food, water, medical and hygiene items, as well as diapers and other infant needs.
Other nonprofits such as Global Empowerment Mission (GEM), South Florida Caribbean Strong and American Friends of Jamaica also have Jamaica relief campaigns in full swing this week.
Aid for Haiti, Cuba, the Bahamas and other Caribbean countries affected by Melissa is also being collected in South Florida locales such as Hialeah.
Though Melissa did not directly strike Haiti, it has suffered the storm's worst death count — at least 30 as of Friday morning — due to severe flooding that overwhelmed the country's fragile infrastructure.
Melissa was one of the strongest recorded hurricanes to ever form in the Atlantic — another sign, say scientists, of how global warming has intensified these storms.
For more information on how to help the Hurricane Melissa relief effort in South Florida, go to WLRN.org
