At the time of this writing, I, like countless others across the state, have been trying to make sense of the devastation left by Hurricane Helene in Western North Carolina. It is hard to fathom and reconcile the images of our beloved mountain communities forever scarred by an unprecedented natural disaster.

Living now in Eastern North Carolina, the annual path of the Atlantic hurricane season is part and parcel of yearly life. The onset of the season brings with it a heightened awareness and healthy respect for those named natural disasters we track each year. North Carolina is one of the most densely rural states in the nation. We are, by most measures, at the top of the nation in number of rural residents and in the number of small towns.

Western North Carolina is well known for its quaint and picturesque small towns. They dot the landscape, providing plot points along backroads and highways, living historical testaments to the resiliency and determination of men and women to claim habitable space in a challenging topography.

However, like many small towns around our state, those communities grew adjacent to water. Water is life, both for the individual and the community. It was a source of transportation, energy, and sustenance for burgeoning economies, industry, and trade. It is both true of those who immigrated to those places many centuries ago and true of the people who called it home for millennia before their arrival.

So, when a natural disaster hits Western North Carolina, there are only so many places a historical amount of rainfall can go, and, tragically, it follows the course of the natural landscape where those communities have flourished.

Nonprofits, of course, are not exempt from the devastation of Hurricane Helene. In watching my news feeds and text threads since the storm made landfall in Florida, I have returned, again and again, to the massive task now facing our nonprofit partners in Western NC and throughout the Southeast. Not only are they faced with the task of caring and providing for their neighbors in need, but many will also have to face the challenges of rebuilding and recovering from their own devastation. Buildings flooded, infrastructure damaged, supplies washed away, and, unimaginably, some will even have to regroup and rebuild from a loss of life.

In the best of times, rural nonprofits face challenges that are not always present for those individuals and organizations located in our larger urban cores. Compounded now with the daunting road to recovery in Western North Carolina, many of the issues rural community builders faced prior to the storm will now be amplified and complicated on the long road to recovery. Next week, we will dive into some of the issues, but for now let’s just stop here and offer encouragement and prayer to our fellow North Carolinians impacted by the storm.

The National Council of Nonprofits offers practical tips to Donors and Nonprofits wanting to assist during this time: Disaster Recovery – What Donors & Nonprofits Need To Know.

If you can, please make a donation to support the many organizations who are hard at work in the rescue and recovery efforts.

• American Red Cross - NC Chapter
• Baptists on Mission‍
• Feeding the Carolinas‍
• Food Bank of Central & Eastern NC
• Mutual Aid Disaster Relief‍
• North Carolina Community Foundation Disaster Relief Fund‍
• Samaritan’s Purse‍
• The Community Foundation of Western North Carolina‍
• The Salvation Army
• United Way of North Carolina

Our hearts go out to our current and past clients, and friends of the firm in Western NC: Manna FoodBank, FIND Outdoors, Western Carolina Medical Society, Asheville Humane Society, YMI Cultural Center, Odyssey School, OnTrack Financial Education & Counseling, Thrive Asheville, Community Foundation of Western NC, Homeward Bound of WNC, Asheville Museum of Science, Mountain Housing Opportunities, Montreat College, and more.

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Todd Brantley is a Senior Advisor with Armstrong McGuire who specializes in board governance, rural community & economic development, faith communities, strategic planning, organizational assessment. Learn more about Todd and check out his other musings in his bio.