The work is just starting.
Let’s move mountains.
09.27.24. 5:00am. Helene bore down with a force that reshaped our watersheds, our homes, and our lives. In Fairview, some of our ridgelines took on 30 inches of rain. Too. much. rain. As we huddled in our homes praying, the mountainsides gave way. Our trees gave way. And our road gave way. Key detail for later: like many mountain communities in WNC, we’re on a shared private road.
Bear Trail, serving our mountain neighborhood of 50 families, took on catastrophic damage. Mudslides, rockslides, landslides, logjams, streams-turned-rivers – you name it, we got it. And the cost to restore access, secure our destabilized slopes, and return to a sense of safety in our own homes… it is staggering. End-of-the-road kind of staggering. And we can’t do it alone.
And we’re not doing it alone. Not at all, it turns out. We’ve been astonished by the generosity, provision, and frankly hard-to-explain love that has been poured out on this mountain. We want to tell this story, and invite you to partner with us to see it through to completion. Keep reading. It’s a good story. Or jump straight in and join us as mountains are moved.
We’re just one of many, many private roads that were damaged or destroyed that Friday morning. On private roads, the burden falls to the home owners to repair. We still get to pay all the taxes! But our homes happen to sit off the map when it comes to state maintenance. We’re praying FEMA comes through, but right now, today, we face the reality that if a neighbor up top had an emergency, no ambulance could reach them. And when it rains again, our gutted stormwater system will be overwhelmed. Once again, our slopes could move. It was too much.
Project 1.0
Coordinates:35.544668, -82.348146
Address: Bear Trail, Fairview NC
Families: 50
Scope: 5 major landslides, flash flood washout, tornado/straight-line-wind damage, dozens of debris piles larger than city buses, 30+ destroyed culverts, over 4,000 feet of damaged or destroyed road
Cost Estimate: $1,200,000
Donations to-date: $92,000
Progress to Goal: 8%
Waiting for the next disaster was too much for us. It was also too much for our first partner. Now we’re to the good part of the story!
When your community has sustained the damage so many of our neighborhoods have, you’re not just looking for shovels and volunteers, you’re praying for a miracle.
Enter that answer to prayer: Brock Mountain Land Company, based out of Barnardsville NC. With over 25 years of experience, they are a uniquely sized, uniquely skilled, and uniquely available team that have responded to the call of loving their neighbors. They show this love by sharing their skills and time as they restore and restabilize destroyed neighborhoods.
When Quincey Brock, co-CEO of Brock Mountain Land Company, surveyed our community he said, “I’ve not wanted to scare people, but you can’t un-see what you see. The first thing that went through my mind, seeing all these houses…everybody in here could have died. Literally. The mudslides that I saw are enormous…some of the houses were within feet of being wiped out.” With a humble confidence this team began working with no promise of pay or recognition as they began the restoration of Bear Trail. The team has called in over 10-million dollars of heavy equipment from Florida, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Not to mention floating the payroll for their 20-25 personnel they have dedicated to Bear Trail.
Brock Mountain has proudly partnered with the Bear Trail Project as they bring restoration to devastated areas and minister love to those affected. Your partnership in prayer, in finance, and in resources will support The Bear Trail Project as we seek to support like-minded contractors by covering their operating and material costs. Because diesel ain’t free and gravel doesn’t grow on trees!
Become a partner in restoration
Donate
We need cash donations, time donations, culverts, bulk material, gravel, boulders, fill, etc. Use the giving button below or send us a message using the form to connect and offer what you can.
Pray
Prayer brought us to this point, and will move us forward. We believe in the power of prayer and invite you to join us and pray for this project – offering up our desires to God, in the name of Jesus, all by the help of his Spirit.
Volunteer
Use the form to connect and share of your time, talent and resources not otherwise mentioned. We’re actively accepting partnerships with qualified professionals and volunteers of every stripe. Think you can help? Let’s talk!
Share
Go tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere. Facebook, insta, text messages to all your old friends… you know the drill.
Give today. Join the story of lives restored.
This secure giving portal is powered by Breeze and is protected by reCAPTCHA. The Bear Trail Project is a disaster recovery ministry of Fairview Christian Fellowship, a certified 501(c)(3) non-profit. All funds are overseen by a third-party accountant for financial oversight and transperanacy. Every dollar will go to funding recovery in this community and beyond. Gifts can also be received securely through the FCF Breeze giving platform. Instruction to donate stock or by check can be found here.
Tell me more.
Who are we and what is our mission?
The Bear Trail Project exists to bring restoration to devastated areas and minister love to those affected. It is a ministry of Fairview Christian Fellowship, a local PCA congregation in Fairview, North Carolina. Through financial partnerships, local contractors in our network will be funded to rebuild roads, repair battered waterways, clear debris, and restore hope and safety to our community.
What is our hope?
One of the greatest hopes of the Bear Trail Project is for our neighbors to feel safe in their homes through the restoration of their shared private roads and waterways. In the wake of Hurricane Helene, many are living in fear of what more rain—not to mention the possibility of another storm—could mean for their community. We seek to cultivate a new reality through the outpouring of love and kindness. We want to see hope restored to those who feel helpless by loving, in a tangible way, as Jesus loves.
How is money received and where does it go?
As a ministry of a religious non-profit organization 501(c)(3); all gifts given to the Bear Trail Project are tax deductible. All financial gifts go into a designated account where they are held and overseen by the Treasurer, Elders, and a third-party financial organization. We will do everything with transparency and integrity – we invite financial scrutiny. As the financial gifts are received, they will stay in the designated account until the contractor completes the agreed upon work and then submits an itemized bill. The contractor will then be paid for the completed work from the Bear Trail Project designated fund according to the bill they provide.
What about FEMA?
Pray with us that we get the funding we need. In the meantime, there’s a massive gap. We’re hoping to pave a way toward grassroots, donor supported recovery that starts on day one.
What if funding comes through?
Fantastic! Then we can move on to the next neighborhood. The next road. The next disaster, and be the bridge that connects displaced individuals with their homes and communities. Every dollar donated will be spent toward restoring access to beautiful humans, from every walk, who have lost so much. We can definitively say it won’t stop at Bear Trail.