Salem Mayor Nic Farley toured the tornado damaged area in the city on Tuesday with an insurance adjuster who made a preliminary damage estimate of $1.7 to $2-million.
Farley has also announced all those in need of temporary housing have had their needs taken care of through the Red Cross, Salvation Army and the social Service Agency BCMW.
His comments came following a Town Hall meeting held Tuesday evening for both storm victims who needed assistance and volunteers who wanted to help.
“I was happy to see 16 of our households represented here of people that needed some help. We had over 33 either volunteers or organizations that came out that have services and assistance to help these people out. I’ve been proud of this community that they are all banding together to help out one another and show everyone we are a community that believes in ourselves and we are going to pick ourselves back up.”
Meanwhile, Public Works Director Annette Sola is appreciative of the growing amount of help, with several church work groups as well as Raccoon and Salem Township and the Marion County Highway Department all offering assistance.
“A lot more help which I can’t say enough about the help we’ve had already. Cutting down the numerous amounts of trees and things we’ve had taken down already is huge. But it’s a little bit more haul off than we can handle on our own in a timely fashion. So getting other crews to help out will get that process going a little quicker.”
Sola says they hauled off another 50 dump truck loads of trees, metal and other debris on Tuesday for a two day total of 120 loads.
The Greater Salem Area Foundation has now set up a special fund to help the tornado victims and will be accepting donations online at www.venmo.com/u/SalemAreaFoundation, at Salem City Hall, or by mail at Post Office Box 1314. Foundation Board Member Tabatha Meador says they are still looking at what type of help to make available.
“Does depend on how much we raised at this point without knowing how much is going to be specific in that fund. It’s to be determined as far as how assistance is dispersed.”
Farley has announced all the money paid to the city for disposal of metal at Foster Salvage will be going into the relief fund.
A back hoe loads up a city dump truck with trees cut up following the Friday tornado damage on the south side of Salem. Photo by Bruce Kropp.
