Lightforce One 2024 Empowerment Campaign
The mission of Lightforce One is to uplift and empower the underprivileged and the marginalized of the world.
To date, our work has been focused on a large orphanage and primary school in Uganda where thousands of lives have been impacted by a well and irrigation system. We have also funded crops, started a chicken farming project, started a brick-making project, opened a third orphanage site for secondary school children who would have normally aged out of the orphanage, started a program for sponsoring children with either annual or monthly donations, and numerous other projects.
We have also started looking at ways to help the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. In a community where alcoholism is reported to impact 80% of families, we will be launching the first AA meetings that we are aware of on the reservation! Right now the closest one is an hour away for most of the population.
Now, we are going to start making bigger differences and impacts with larger projects intended to have meaningful impacts on even more lives!
Lightforce One is raising $50,000 for ambitious projects planned throughout the end of 2024. Our efforts will be focused on continuing our work in Africa and beginning work on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, located in South Dakota.
Lightforce One is not affiliated with any religion and as such, does not proselytize. We are simply here to make the world a better place for the less fortunate with no strings attached.
Uganda
Lightforce One works with an orphanage in Uganda that has over 500 children in primary school and almost 100 children in secondary school. This work takes place in and benefits two villages and one small city. The primary focus of our work there is to help them become financially self-sufficient with projects like agriculture, making bricks, and soon metal fabrication.
Problems like drug and alcohol abuse and AIDS are large contributors to children becoming orphans in Uganda. So, we want to start working on root causes and prevent the problem of children becoming orphaned from happening in the first place. We will be starting some community programs such as alcohol abuse recovery by starting and supporting A.A. meetings.
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To date, we have added chicken farming and wheat crops to the agricultural program in Uganda. This year, we will launch a pig farming project. The profits from raising pigs will be used to help with the general budget of the orphanage we work with.
In Uganda, metal fabrication is an important trade. Almost all doors and windows are made by metal fabricators, as well as the higher quality bunk beds (which are sorely needed at the orphanage).
We will be purchasing all of the necessary equipment and protective gear to start metal fabrication. The items mentioned above can be made either for the orphanage to use or for them to sell and raise money for the orphanage operations.
Currently, there is only one A.A. group in the entire country of Uganda. It is located in Kampala, the largest city of the country.
We will be working to establish an A.A. group in the city of Jinja and then expand some meetings into the villages.
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation
Pine Ridge is the most economically challenged community in the United States and among the most challenged in the western hemisphere.
- Alcoholism is reported to impact 80% of families
- Median household income is about $5,000 per year
- Unemployment ranges from 80 to 90%
- Often 3 and 4 families live in single-family homes, many of which are mobile homes
- High school drop-out rate is over 70%
- The teen suicide rate is 3 times the national average
The founder of Lightforce One has wanted to work to help these people for years. Below are some of the projects that we have planned for 2024.
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Whilealcoholism is reported to impact 80% of families, there is not a single AA meeting on the reservation that we are aware of. The closest one is in Rapid City which is about a one-hour drive for a large portion of the population and even farther for others. While AA is not the only answer for alcoholism and it doesn’t work for everybody, as Father Joseph Murphy, a respected speaker on the subject, says: “AA is what works best for most”
Lightforce One will work on building out a robust AA presence on the reservation.
According to the Pine Ridge Area Chamber of Commerce 80% of the money that comes into the reservation, leaves the reservation within 72 hours. This is because they need to leave the reservation for goods and services.
For example, to our knowledge, there are no appliance repair businesses on the reservation. In order to have an appliance repaired, one would have to contact a business in Rapid City.
Lightforce One plans to send someone from the reservation to a trade school specializing in appliance repair. We will then provide them with the equipment, knowledge, and coaching to launch a successful appliance repair business on the reservation. This way the money spent on appliance repairs can stay on the reservation and continue circulating there. This helps to build an ecosystem on the reservation.