By CV Vice-Chair Peter Stanley

Clinica Verde is excited to announce that we are now into our first full month of construction on the medical clinic building itself.

On February 1, 2010 we began excavation of the clinic foundations including the 40,000 gallon underground cistern that will be used to collect rainwater during the winter months and then used for irrigation of the organic gardens during the summer. In order to prepare the site for foundations we removed over 300 cubic meters of sonsecuite, a very dense and unstable clay like soil that is not conducive for a stabilizing structural base. We brought back in an equal amount of an engineered fill that was put in place and compacted to prepare the site for the building foundations.

The construction schedule is set to run for 10 months with building completion at the end of October 2010. Clinica Verde's design team here in the United States and Nicaragua has been working over the past year to finalize the building design and to verify the $650,000 construction budget that we have carried throughout this fundraising period. Final bids came in right at our original estimate of $650K but because our design and construction schedules stretched longer than we originally expected we've absorbed additional costs that take our total project budget approximately 10% higher than our estimates. The team will continue to refine the design and budget with the goal of bringing in the total project cost at the original $650,000 estimate.

NOTE: We've raised about 90% of our construction goal, but still have a ways to go to complete clinic construction. Please contact us if you know any supporters who can assist us in our goal – individuals, small family foundations, businesses with an interest in doing good. We want to get Clinica Verde built so we can move on to the work of programs and medical care for our cherished patients.

I want to help Clinica Verde change lives.

Susan Shay is founding partner of Reed Shay & Company, an executive search firm specializing in the Silicon Valley that counts among its clients eBay, Amazon.com, Facebook, Yahoo and Netflix and is the leader of innovative practices in its industry. She is currently on sabbatical from day-to-day search activities and is studying at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. Her humanitarian interests include work on behalf of Human Translation, a non-profit working primarily in Southeast Asia.

Why do I believe Clinica Verde is on the right track? First and last, Clinica Verde is about the people, from the passionate commitment of its founder and leadership team, to the response from the community it is committed to serve – a response which is not only predicated on need, but also on commitment of those most intimately involved, both through effort and financial commitment.

Clinica Verde is designed to respond to the needs of the community it serves, rather than to some abstract notion of what is "good" for the people of that community according to our standards. Hence, the odds that this effort will meet the test of sustainability and therefore success, is increased exponentially. Another aspect of Clinica Verde which resonates with my deepest concerns and belief in a sustainable future for all, is its commitment to finding ways to use whatever materials and technology that are most available, environmentally friendly and sustainable in the context of the project.

Currently, Clinica Verde is building its prototype in Nicaragua, Central America. The vision of Clinica Verde however is global and the principals and practices which this project is developing are being applied in the laboratory of real life.

I'd like to help too!

Is there something you'd like us to include in these newsletters that we're missing? Let us know what kinds of stories or information you want. We'd love to hear from you.