History of Origin

Mercy & Sharing was co-founded by Susie and Joe Krabacher in 1994. Susie and Joe are evangelical Christians and Mercy & Sharing is an outreach ministry to abandoned and mistreated children in the Republic of Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere.

The mission has expanded in recent years to providing food aid to the elderly and oppressed in northern Haiti. God has been faithful to the mission and has blessed the approximately 5,100 children and elderly.

Mercy and Sharing’s Board of Directors and co-founders contribute more than 100% of all overhead and administrative expenses, so 100% of outside donations go directly to the projects in Haiti.

“Our God is greater than the satanic forces in Haiti, who continue to plague the country with detestable voodoo practices, and the vision for Mercy & Sharing is for God to establish firmly His power and glory and to defeat the rulers, the authorities and the powers of this dark world and to defeat the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” -Joe & Susie

Details Of Operation

Mercy & Sharing has established a number of projects in Haiti in an effort to provide a safe haven for the many abandoned, malnourished and impoverished children who have nowhere else to turn. In Haiti one of every three children dies by age 5. These projects are designed to provide a loving, caring and nurturing environment, and to provide opportunities for intellectual and spiritual growth and training. Only by healing the next generation of children can Haiti have any hope of overcoming its problems. Please help us to help the children of Haiti in this endeavor.

Abandoned Baby Unit
The abandoned baby unit at the public hospital, Hopital d’Etat de l’Universite, has been operated by Mercy and Sharing since 1994 and was one of our first projects. We discovered a back room next to the morgue at the public hospital where the children who were either severely handicapped or had little hope of survival were discarded by the staff of the public hospital. These are the “throw away” children who have no family, or have severe handicaps or birth defects. Unfortunately, Haitian voodoo practices teach that birth defects and handicapped children are evidence of satanic curses and many of the children we have received at the abandoned the baby unit have been found in cardboard boxes, in dumps, and found in sewage canals. While we have had a tenuous relationship with the hospital’s administration and government, whenever we are given government permission we remove these children and placed them in one of our orphanages. Mercy and Sharing pays for support staff, food, water and medical care for the children. Any special care or surgery required by these children is the responsibility of Mercy and Sharing and our network of volunteers. These children are cared for and brought to the best possible health and are eventually moved to our orphanages where their care will continue.

Cite Soliel School and Feeding Program
This project, which was our first in Haiti, was built for $12,000. It is located in the worst slum in the Western Hemisphere, a 27 square mile slum that was built on a garbage dump. Even prior to the most recent catastrophic earthquakes in Haiti, this area had no electricity, no running water, open sewage canals, no sanitation system, and was infested with disease and death. The slum is not patrolled by the police, and it is unusual for the even the United Nations peacekeeping forces to go into the slums due to gang violence. Because we have worked there now for 16 years, our project is protected and held in high esteem by the unfortunate who have to inhabit this slum.

Mercy House Orphanage (Cazeau)
The Mercy House Orphanage, located in Port-au-Prince, was home to 43 non-handicapped children who live on the grounds full time and over 60 handicapped children. Many of these children were recently moved to the Williamson Campus so at the time of the earthquake we only had a handful of children and while the facilities have suffered serious damage, none of the children are injured. These children are provided with housing, clothing, three meals daily and fresh water. They are educated at the John Branchizio School, also located in Port-au-Prince.

Mercy Health Center
This is our new state-of-the-art center serving the very poor in the Delmas 75 area of Port-au-Prince. We can serve up to 40 outpatients a day, including pre and post-natal care. We are able to deliver services that would otherwise be unavailable in the area, and we can reach patients who would otherwise go untreated. In doing so we can make a considerable difference in the lives of these desperately poor people. This is an outpatient facility at this time until further licensing is obtained in Haiti. We have four doctors and a number of nurses on staff in addition to numerous support personnel and physical therapists.

Cervical Cancer Screening Program
Thanks to specific funding from one of our generous donors, we are now able to completely implement a Cervical Cancer Screening Program at the center as well, which will undoubtedly save the lives of countless Haitian women through the treatment and prevention of this needless source of death. Remarkably, cervical cancer is the No. 2 killer in Haiti, right after the biggest killer – diarrhea.

Williamson Campus
Mercy and Sharing’s new Williamson campus, located approximately 40 miles west northwest of Port au Prince has three new orphanage buildings, community and facility wells with fresh water, a church and feeding center, guard tower, depot, medical clinic and is surrounded by a ¾ mile long wall. This property is approximately 20 acres and we have installed 200 banana trees. Currently this facility houses approximately 106 healthy and disabled/terminally ill children. They are given nutritious food, freshwater, clothing, shelter, education and above all, love. With roughly 70% or children disabled or terminally ill, we have implemented a physical therapy program that is greatly improving their quality of life.

Feeding Programs
The Mercy and Sharing feeding programs of saved lives of literally thousands of children and elderly folks who otherwise would not have food to eat. The feeding program operates at the Mercy and Sharing schools, clinics, orphanages, Abandoned Baby Unit and two small villages (Paulette and Phaeton) in northern Haiti. We have more than 1,500 beneficiaries in our programs and we provided more than 830,000 meals in 2009.

School Programs
Mercy and Sharing gives more than 630 children a chance of the better life through our school programs. We have three schools, the John Branchizio school in Cazeau, the City Soliel school and the orphanage school at the Williamson campus. The children are given school supplies, books, clean drinking water, and as a part of our feeding program – a hot meal five days a week – even during the summertime. Mercy and Sharing also pays the salaries of the teachers and owns and operates the facilities.

Shipping
In 2009, Mercy and Sharing shipped and distributed over 350 tons of food, medical supplies and goods to Haiti. We are always seeking donations of containers of food and supplies. We distribute these donations and through our in-country infrastructure. We operate a warehouse near the shipping port in Port au Prince where we stage deliveries throughout the country.

Susie Krabacher – Co-Founder

Susie Krabacher is a dedicated humanitarian whose work with saving, feeding, and educating the poorest of the poor has been featured in People magazine, Marie Claire, The Wall Street Journal, the Chicago Tribune, the Denver Post, The Canadian Post, the San Francisco Chronicle and the LA Times, among other publications. Susie was a recent honoree of the World of Children, which recognizes the outstanding work of humanitarian’s throughout the globe. Susie’s work has also been broadcast on good morning America, Inside Edition and the Oprah Winfrey show. The driving force behind the incredible work of Mercy and Sharing, Suzy is a relentless advocate for the children, and was the recipient of the prestigious 2000 International Humanitarian Award from the National Association for the Advancement of Haitians in Washington, DC and was granted honorary citizenship as a Haitian citizen. She is also featured in the Hall of Fame of the Miami Children’s Hospital. Simon & Schuster – Touchstone published its Susie’s autobiography “Angels of a Lower Flight” on her work in 2008.

Joe Krabacher – Co-Founder

Joe Krabacher is one of the most blessed men in business today. Married to the former Susie Scott, Joe enjoys a thriving law practice in Aspen, Colorado with the law firm of Sherman Howard. Valedictorian of his law school class and editor of the law review, he is the recipient of five American Jurisprudence Awards. Joe co-founded a satellite communications company and a fiber-optic networking company. He is responsible for legal matters as well as financial and auditing matters for Mercy and Sharing, speaks two languages, plays the piano, guitar, saxophone and flute, and is an avid windsurfer and snowboarder.