CIC, CCIF Partner to Support Haiti Arise

ATLANTA, April 9, 2015—Marc Honorat, founder of Canadian philanthropic organization Haiti Arise,  gave a passionate presentation to kick off the second day of the Collision Industry Conference (CIC) meetings at the Crowne Plaza Ravinia in Atlanta on Thursday.

Following a roughly 10-minute video that highlighted the work Haiti Arise has done in providing educational resources, training facilities and community support projects in the country. One of Haiti Arise’s programs consists of technical training in trade fields, such as collision repair.

CIC and its sister organization in Canada, the Canadian Collision Industry Forum (CCIF), are partnering with Haiti Arise to help build a collision repair facility in Haiti, and CCIF chair Tom Bissonnette and CIC’s Jeff Hendler encouraged Thursday’s crowds to offer its support. 

“It’s a great opportunity for the people in the collision business; it’s not an easy business, and I think that’s why people are so willing to help others,” Bissonnette said.

Honorat is a native Haitian and a former child slave, who, as a boy, was sponsored by a Canadian family to go to school and, eventually, college. After moving to Canada, he formed Haiti Arise in 2000 and began his quest to revitalize his native country.

Thursday, he asked the collision repair industry for support.

“You can change someone’s life, transform someone’s life, and our heart and desire and goal and vision isn’t to give them the fish, but to teach them the fish,” Honorat told the crowd.