The State and mem­bers of the pub­lic have stepped in to sup­port a sin­gle moth­er of four whose strug­gles to not on­ly make ends meet, but to keep her chil­dren safe in their Bras­so Vil­lage, Tabaquite home, were high­light­ed by Guardian Me­dia last week.

On Sep­tem­ber 9, Guardian Me­dia told the sto­ry of Eli­cia Bal­con-Corbin, who was try­ing to pro­vide for the chil­dren on a mea­gre $500 that she re­ceived from her fa­ther’s so­cial wel­fare cheque.

Bal­con-Corbin showed Guardian Me­dia the state of her home, which was in­fest­ed with rats. There was lit­tle to no fur­ni­ture in the home, with the moth­er be­ing forced to sit on a garbage bag filled with clothes to con­duct the in­ter­view. The roof was al­so leak­ing and the wa­ter they col­lect­ed in bar­rels out­side the small house was con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed.

Bal­con-Corbin said they were so fo­cused on sur­vival, she some­times did not have enough food, clean clothes or mon­ey to send some of the chil­dren to school.

Fol­low­ing the pub­li­ca­tion of her plight, sev­er­al mem­bers of the pub­lic came to the fam­i­ly’s as­sis­tance, do­nat­ing not on­ly mon­ey but fur­ni­ture. A com­pa­ny al­so pledged to as­sist with ex­ter­mi­nat­ing the rats.

Guardian Me­dia was told a wa­ter tank was be­ing do­nat­ed and a Guyanese na­tion­al was try­ing to lo­cate the fa­ther of the chil­dren in Guyana to of­fer him a job so he can help with pro­vid­ing for the chil­dren.

Bal­con-Corbin said he was de­port­ed ear­li­er this year.

The non-gov­ern­men­tal or­gan­i­sa­tion Pil­lars of Truth al­so vis­it­ed the fam­i­ly and its mem­bers gave the home a ma­jor facelift by re­pair­ing the roof, pro­vid­ing a stove and paint­ing in­side the house. A short video sent to Guardian Me­dia from the NGO showed that school sup­plies were al­so pro­vid­ed for the chil­dren. The chil­dren range in ages from one month to nine years.

Help will al­so come from the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices. In a me­dia re­lease sent yes­ter­day, the min­istry said its staff con­duct­ed a vis­it on Sep­tem­ber 12 af­ter learn­ing of Bal­con-Corbin’s sit­u­a­tion via the news­pa­per ar­ti­cle.

The min­istry said be­fore the vis­it, through its Na­tion­al So­cial De­vel­op­ment Pro­gramme (NS­DP), it con­tact­ed the moth­er and ob­tained rel­e­vant in­for­ma­tion on the house­hold sit­u­a­tion and an as­sess­ment of the fam­i­ly’s im­me­di­ate re­quire­ments was com­plet­ed.

The re­lease said dur­ing the vis­it, the min­istry was able to con­duct fur­ther as­sess­ments on the house struc­ture, plumb­ing fa­cil­i­ties and elec­tri­cal wiring. The min­istry al­so pro­vid­ed in­for­ma­tion on how as­sis­tance could be ren­dered through var­i­ous grants.

It said through the Mi­nor House Re­pair As­sis­tance Grant, peo­ple can ac­cess $15,000 in ma­te­ri­als for re­pairs and up­grades. Coun­selling ser­vices were al­so of­fered to the fam­i­ly mem­bers through its Fam­i­ly Ser­vices Di­vi­sion. Dur­ing her in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Bal­con-Corbin had asked for men­tal health sup­port.