Rainbow Network shines in rural Nicaragua

“We’re (God’s) rainbow on the ground,” Jaspers said. “He’s put us here to help deliver that hope and protection personally.”

That’s the foundation of his 10-year-old Rainbow Network, a Springfield-based interdenominational Christian mission organization providing housing, economic development, education and health care to one of the poorest places in the world – rural Nicaragua.

From a poor background himself, Jaspers in 1985 took some profits from his fledgling Branson hotel business to start a small network of Nicaraguan workers.

Rainbow Network was born, serving five Nicaraguan communities and around 4,000 people.

Area churches, business leaders and health and educational professionals have followed Jaspers’ lead, supporting the nonprofit charity with cash, ideas and professional services.

Rainbow Network has reached 97 communities and more than 42,000 Nicaraguans. A $2 million annual budget – all from donations – finances Rainbow Network’s four programs in economic development, education, health care and housing.

Among Rainbow Network’s accomplishments, according to Jaspers:

• opening 300 grade schools with 8,000 students “who would not know how to read or write,”

• building 445 houses for 3,200 residents “that were living in destitute, dirt-floor shacks,”

• treating 200,000 sick people “most of whom have never seen a doctor in their lives,” and

• serving more than 12 million meals to people who “were starving to death.”

The work is completed by a Nicaraguan staff of 65, including 10 physicians and two dentists, and two Springfield employees – Director Mark Struckhoff and Development Coordinator Alice Wingo. Retired Parkview teacher Romona Baker is a full-time volunteer.

Jaspers, who owns two hotels in Branson and two in St. Louis, said the theory is to give Nicaraguans the tools to work and let them take it from there. Six Nicaraguan network offices organize approximately 2,000 volunteers to work on any given day.

“We guide them and lead them and train them. And then they do it,” Jaspers said.

Rainbow Network is working to slowly change the lives and futures of Nicaraguans living in an 1,800-square-mile area where the average annual family income is less than $500.

The latest emphasis is on economic development and housing.

Attorney Jim Burt initiated a fund-raising drive this year to increase the economic development loan fund from $181,000 to $500,000; they’re about $100,000 short, Jaspers said.

The expectation is that average loan sizes would grow to more than $150 among 3,000 families. The cash infusions allow residents to fix up their homes – laying a cement floor, for example – and improve their diets, health and education but also finance entrepreneurial activities.

In partnership with Habitat for Humanity International, there is a three-year goal to build 500 homes at $1,600 each.

Rainbow Network is run by a board of directors chaired by Rocky Levell. Jaspers said some of the local program leaders are Charlie and Mary Beth O’Reilly and attorney Burt in economic development; Drs. Bob Carolla, Tom Froehlich and Wendell Scott in health care; Kenny Bowling, Jack Hood and Duane Ottmar in contracting; and volunteer Baker in education.

Baker, who also serves as board secretary, became involved much like many area professionals have – through one of Jaspers’ mission visits. Baker was particularly impressed with the network’s organization.

“The way it’s run is businesslike, which is Keith’s strong point,” she said. “There’s an accountability to it that you can trust.”

The group says every dollar is accounted for and the same accountants handle the books for Rainbow Network and Jaspers’ hotels.

Jaspers said the visits, which he takes every six weeks, act as a recruitment tool.

“Once they go down there and see it, they just can’t believe. They come back and respond in a huge way and get others to do the same,” Jaspers said. “We would invite business owners and managers to go down to Nicaragua to see what we do firsthand.”

Jaspers’ next trip is in January, and another is planned for March.

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