Staff of Catholic Charities, Diocese of Camden donated $500 to the recently established Father Larry Snyder Disaster Relief Fund in honor of the twelve years of service to the agency by former assistant director Jennifer Dyer.
Staff members donated to the fund during Dyer’s farewell party on Nov. 21. She began her new position as executive director of Catholic Charities, Diocese of Gary, Indiana, on Dec. 1.
“Given Father Larry’s role in developing our national capabilities, and Jennifer’s work in disaster response, we thought this was a wonderful way of honoring both,” said executive director of the Diocese of Camden agency, Kevin Hickey.
The fund was established to commemorate the ten-year legacy of outgoing president of Catholic Charities USA, Fr. Larry Snyder.
“[The fund] will be used to support Catholic Charities’ ongoing efforts to assist those affected by natural and man-made disasters,” said a Catholic Charities USA press release when the fund was unveiled in early October. “[It] will be housed at CCUSA and used to support a national response when disaster strikes.”
Dyer’s tenure with Catholic Charities, Diocese of Camden saw her involvement with disasters that included the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and Super Storm Sandy in 2012.
In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Dyer was sent by Catholic Charities USA on a Gulf Coast tour to survey Catholic Charities agencies’ current disaster response capabilities. From these experiences, she helped develop Catholic Charities USA’s disaster training curriculum and helped conduct trainings and respond to disasters across the country.
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Camden’s Katrina response also developed thanks to Dyer’s experiences on the Gulf Coast. Dyer planned and implemented a volunteer program called Project One that sent nearly 600 diocesan parishioners to the Gulf region in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita between 2007 and 2009 to assist with recovery.
Those experiences served the Camden Diocese agency well when Super Storm Sandy hit the New Jersey coast in 2012.