Elizabeth Careese Vega

Elizabeth Vega was watching the news when she saw the damage Hurricane Katrina had done to New Orleans.

She wanted to do something to help, so she decided to make fliers and put them on every door in her town asking for donations to help the Katrina victims. It started off slow, but her dad worked for the Tri-Town News and asked if they could put an article asking for donations to help the victims and her mother asked Circle Drive Alliance Church if they would allow donations to be dropped off at the church. Tri-Town News and Circle Drive Alliance Church became drop off points for the donations.

Once the ad was put into the news, more people in the community came together to help. Letters started pouring in, more newspapers started to call and donations started pouring in!

Elizabeth's family came together to help pack all the donations but there was one problem, no one was able to help send these items to New Orleans. Elizabeth's mom called several places and they had no luck. Finally, Elizabeth wrote a letter to the President of the United States asking for help. When Elizabeth thought all hope was lost, a trucker saw the article in the newspaper and decided to load his tractor trailer up with all the donations. He did not charge a cent for fuel and drove everything down to New Orleans.

Elizabeth received a letter from the President of the United States saying how pleased he was with her achievement.