BELMONT, Westmoreland – With the help of corporate entities and church groups, Earl Cotterel and his family are well on their way to restoring their three-bedroom house in Belmont, Westmoreland.

Their home was destroyed in a fire last Christmas, leaving damage estimated at $3.5 million. The blaze occurred while Cotterel was away in the Cayman Islands. He was back in Jamaica by Boxing Day, standing amidst the charred remains of his worldly possessions.

But on that same spot, there is now a large, though incomplete, structure which will eventually be a four-bedroom house, complete with a wash room.

“A lot of people rally ’round me to get me back on my feet,” the father of four told the Observer this week, “and I have to give God the glory because a lot of people who got burnt out can’t make a restart.”

At the same time, he recalled that last year’s fire was just one in a series of misfortunes he experienced during the year.

His brother, he said, was murdered in June and his father died in October. And Cotterel has known tragedy before – last Christmas was not the first time he had lost a home to a disaster. The June floods of 1979 claimed his first home.

But unlike in 1979, Cotterel will not have to single-handedly rebuild this time around. After hearing of the fire at his home last year, the Bluefields People Community Association (BPCA) pitched in to assist him and have been doing so ever since. On January 17 this year, they staged a gospel concert in the community that earned them $50,000 in profit and an additional $100,000 from contributors who were contacted for assistance. They also managed to secure donations of furniture from the Courts furniture store in Savanna-la-Mar and cash from Jamaica National as well as Dehring, Bunting and Golding. In addition, both the Auldayr Seventh Day Adventist Church and the Belmont Missionary Church have given their assistance.

“It makes one feel proud to know that you can help a less fortunate family to rebuild, get back on its feet and continue to live a normal life as it was before this unfortunate experience,” said Howard Pottinger, JNBS branch manager in Savanna-la-Mar.

Keith Wedderburn, the BPCA’s project coordinator, estimated that the restoration would cost $4 million, but said that a significant amount of the work to be done would be undertaken by volunteers. Thirty volunteers, he said, were expected in Belmont to do community work in June and the Cotterel project will be high on their list.