Changing the World with Paint
updated 1:29 PM EST, Fri November 16, 2012
Changing the world with paint
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Rony Delgarde reprocesses donated paint and ships it to organizations in developing countries
- Delgarde founded the nonprofit Global Paint for Charity in Atlanta
- His goal is to rehabilitate and beautify struggling communities and protect the environment
- Global Paint is raising money for a machine to process large quantities of donated paint
"People paint their house
yellow, white, red, blue and I said, 'Wow, there's so much paint in
this country!'" Delgarde says." I said, 'When I get money in this
country, I'm going to buy paint and take paint back home.'"
From that idea, Global
Paint for Charity was born. Delgarde, who is 38 and works as a health
care consultant, states the mission: "to recycle leftover paint from
businesses and residents, processes it and then donate it to vulnerable
families in developing countries all around the world."
Delgarde explains the process for making paint in Haiti.
"We cut down trees and we
started fire. We pick out rocks from the river and we put it inside the
fire and close the fire for a week. And once it's done, it's a
wonderful powder." He points out that this type of paint washes away in
the rain.
Delgarde's nonprofit organization wants to make a lasting difference.
Two years ago, Delgarde
started going to construction sites in the Atlanta area, asking them
what they did with their leftover paint.
He told them, "I want to
collect your paint and take it someplace where people don't have access
to paint. We'll give them paint and we'll change their lives. That's
when I started collecting paint."
The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency estimates that approximately 10% of the 637 million
gallons of paint sold annually is left over, equal to about 64 million
gallons per year.
So far, Delgarde has
donated 6,000 gallons of paint to projects in Kenya, Haiti and Uganda.
He recently returned from Equatorial Guinea, where he donated 200
gallons of paint to an orphanage for children who lost their parent to
HIV/AIDS.
"We looked at schools,
hospitals, family homes and they were not painted. It really touched my
heart to see the bacteria on the walls that were not painted. I said we
have to do something," he says.
Those looking to donate their leftover paint can visit the website of the group, GlobalPaints.Org, and fill out a request for a pickup.
Ed Spencer, a consultant
in Atlanta, says he donated his paint for several reasons. "Recycling
is number one and helping people is obviously number two. I think he's
taken something very difficult for people to do correctly, that's
recycling paint and created a way to do it and do it safely. And quite
honestly, he's made it very inexpensive for people. It can be very
expensive to get rid of large amounts of paint."
James Doherty, museum
information specialist at the Jimmy Carter Library and Museum in
Atlanta, was thrilled to be able to donate the museum's leftover paint
to such a good cause.
"I was really excited to
hear about Global Paint and the use for the paint in Third World
nations because we have such a hard time getting rid of paint, and this
kills two birds with one stone. It keeps the paint out of the landfills
and it also goes to a good use," Spencer says.
Although he has received
phone calls from all around the country, Delgarde gets most of his
paint donations from the Atlanta area.
In addition to paint
donations, Delgarde also receives monetary donations to help offset cost
of shipping the paint. He doesn't do it alone either; he has a board of
directors that consists of volunteer small business owners and
government officials.
After picking up the
paint, Delgarde drives to one of three storage units. "The other units
are already completely full," he says.
As he slides up the door to the unit, it's obvious; this one is almost full as well.
"We used to have a small
warehouse where we would process the paint. We would separate the paint
by color, by brand, by characteristic and then go through a
consolidation process. We put it all into five-gallon containers and
that we ship to people in the developing world."
Delgarde says that the
calls for paint donations have grown from 12 weekly to between 300 and
400 hundred per day. Now, he needs to find a new warehouse to start
processing paint again.
"We've been receiving a
lot of paint. We need that paint, so we can give paint to everybody, to
beautify the world, that's my goal. But we need someplace where we can
process the paint," he says.
Students from Georgia
Tech have partnered with Global Paint to design a machine that can
process the paint. The board of directors for Global Paint has been
working to raise the $95,000 it will cost to build the machine.
"We will be able to make
3,000 gallons of paint per day if we have that machine. That would be
my dream come true," Delgarde says.
Delgarde recalls a letter that he received from a woman in Uganda who received paint.
"Her painted house
uplifted her spirits. She feels happier. She feel the kids bring joy in
the house because she can hear the noise, they are so happy. We bring
joy with the paint we were able to donate. To me, that touched my
heart."
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