To help the Katrina victims...
Here's an email I received on Wednesday that outlines the best ways to help in the relief effort:
I've seen the posts from those of you who want to help in the recovery in the affected areas and want to offer some advice from a survivor and volunteer worker for the immediate past three storms to hit my area.
If you want to donate money, my suggestions are these;
1st. Salvation Army. You get the biggest "bang" for your buck with them. They are generally first on the ground with food. Their portable kitchens feed people without regard to circumstance, race, creed or any other qualifier without question. Theirs is the lowest "overhead" of any charity on the scene. Less than 10%.
2. Hold your donations of anything but cash until some of the mess is cleaned up. People with no home, no food and no water, no sanitary facilities, have no place to put clothes, furniture, toys, etc.
3. If you can take some time off work and want to help, contact any one of the hundreds of religious and civic groups who will send service and repair teams into the area within several days and be there for weeks. This labor of love is one of the most valuable gifts you can give.
4. If you have some reservation about giving to the salvation army, give to the Red Cross, they do wonderful work, but are subsidised by the government and their adnministrative costs are evry high so the money does not always get to where you intended it to go.
5. Prayers are inexpenisive and seriously needed.
6. This is going to be a long recovery, very long [we are still recovering from Ivan of a year ago], there will be opportunities to help for months to come.
7. The first responses are already paid for by your taxes and will continue to be paid for by your taxes into the foreseeable future.
I will be on the ground in Boloxi in the next 24 hours for three days, then back home to rest and recover and back there for three days until we can stabilize the area, at least. I'll try to keep the list serves posted from the ground. We are taking the camper and the laptop so that we have places for us to stay while we work.
more to come.
scott
Scott Foster
Running harder in Retirement than I ever worked!!!!
Navarre, Florida 32566
I've seen the posts from those of you who want to help in the recovery in the affected areas and want to offer some advice from a survivor and volunteer worker for the immediate past three storms to hit my area.
If you want to donate money, my suggestions are these;
1st. Salvation Army. You get the biggest "bang" for your buck with them. They are generally first on the ground with food. Their portable kitchens feed people without regard to circumstance, race, creed or any other qualifier without question. Theirs is the lowest "overhead" of any charity on the scene. Less than 10%.
2. Hold your donations of anything but cash until some of the mess is cleaned up. People with no home, no food and no water, no sanitary facilities, have no place to put clothes, furniture, toys, etc.
3. If you can take some time off work and want to help, contact any one of the hundreds of religious and civic groups who will send service and repair teams into the area within several days and be there for weeks. This labor of love is one of the most valuable gifts you can give.
4. If you have some reservation about giving to the salvation army, give to the Red Cross, they do wonderful work, but are subsidised by the government and their adnministrative costs are evry high so the money does not always get to where you intended it to go.
5. Prayers are inexpenisive and seriously needed.
6. This is going to be a long recovery, very long [we are still recovering from Ivan of a year ago], there will be opportunities to help for months to come.
7. The first responses are already paid for by your taxes and will continue to be paid for by your taxes into the foreseeable future.
I will be on the ground in Boloxi in the next 24 hours for three days, then back home to rest and recover and back there for three days until we can stabilize the area, at least. I'll try to keep the list serves posted from the ground. We are taking the camper and the laptop so that we have places for us to stay while we work.
more to come.
scott
Scott Foster
Running harder in Retirement than I ever worked!!!!
Navarre, Florida 32566
Comments
Post a Comment