The Challenges of Donation Management

One of the lasting images of Hurricane Katrina is the mass of people outside the Superdome asking for water from National Guard troops who had none to give. People all over the world saw a city under water, and the human misery it created, and wanted to respond in some way.

But the United States had never before been a recipient of foreign disaster relief, so the outpouring of goodwill became a foreign policy disasteroffending even our closest ally, Great Britain, when their proffered MREs (meals ready-to-eat) were warehoused in Arkansas and ultimately given to other nations because of fears of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease). Offers of oil, cruise ships, and doctors ran afoul of American regulations and became diplomatic disasters.

However, the cumulative $60 million in cash donations to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) from a variety of smaller nations was redirected to a consortium of nonprofit organizations led by the United Methodist Commission on Relief (UMCOR). The UMCOR ultimately provided case work services for Katrina victims in Texas, Arkansas, and Atlanta, an essential recovery service not previously funded by federal disaster relief.

Loma Prieta Earthquake

In 1989, the Loma Prieta Earthquake struck the San Francisco Bay Area, knocking down a freeway connection to the Bay Bridge, damaging the upper level of the bridge, and collapsing unreinforced masonry structures as far away as Santa Cruz and Watsonville, California.

A community in North Carolina heard about the Mexican migrant workers who were made homeless by the collapses in Watsonville, and filled a tractor trailer truck with boxes and bags of used clothing, canned goods, and toys. A week after the earthquake, the truck driver arrived at Watsonville City Hall and asked where to deliver the truckload of charity. The beleaguered employees replied that there was nowhere in town to deliver the goods. Replying that he had a scheduled pick up in San Jose that afternoon, the driver opened the truck, unloaded everything onto the street and sidewalk in front of City Hallodd shoes, ripped bags, dented cansand left.

While the employees were trying to find a means of contacting the countys Red Cross chapter in Salinas (electricity and phone service were still intermittent) in hopes that they could suggest a solution, it started to rain. By nightfall the donations were a soggy, muddy mess. Ultimately city sanitation workers had to be diverted from disaster response work to load dump trucks of sodden material and remove it, consuming years of landfill capacity in the process. Because it was not debris from the disasterhaving been delivered a week after the earthquakethe state and federal government refused to pay for the clean-up and removal of the ruined donations.

Plan for Donations

These two examples highlight the need for community disaster plans so the likelihood of unexpected donations can be addressed in a timely manner.

This plan should include partnering with local nonprofit organizations that handle used items and donations of goods on a regular basis. For example, in San Jose, the Collaborating Agencies Disaster Relief Effort (CADRE) organizes the nonprofits into functional areas that mirror their day-to-day work.

One member, Second Harvest Food Bank, receives post-disaster food donations because it has the appropriate warehouses and refrigerators to store usable food, as well as staff and volunteers who know how to sort usable from unusable food items. St. Vincent DePaul accepts clothing, toys, and household goods into a sorting warehouse, passing along the usable items to its store, where disaster victims can bring vouchers to obtain basic clothing in the correct sizes and needed household items.

Both Second Harvest and St. Vincent DePaul have trucks and drivers that are used weekly for disposal of non-disaster unusable materials, and an on-going relationship with the local government that provides a grant to cover disposal of unwanted and unrecyclable materials at the landfill.

Donations of goods can place a significant burden on a community already struggling with disaster recovery. Storage for the goods, even those that might be useful, will be in short supply after a disaster with a major community impact, such as a hurricane, flood, wild land urban interface fire, or earthquake. Because the unsolicited post-disaster donations are likely to be extremely varied, volunteers or employees must determine the appropriateness of the items and develop a plan for the timely use of perishables.

Renting appropriate space to house disaster donations adds to the financial burden of a community, whose tax base is in ruins, cutting general fund resources for all purposes. Filling the space with racks or shelving, developing a sorting and inventory system, and making the goods available in some way to the victims is both expensive and time consuming.

Ask for Cash

Public education regarding disaster donations should be offered after every large-scale disaster as a reminder of the best way to manage the desire to help. Cash donations to established charities, such as the American Red Cross or the Salvation Army, are the best way for community members to express their concern for victims. The funds can be delivered in a computer key stroke for timely application to victim needs. The cost of shipping goods across the country or around the world can be prevented, and that money could be used instead for the purchase of needed goods locally.

Large retailers, including Walmart, K-Mart, and Lowes, demonstrated immediately after Katrina how quickly they can restore their supply chain to deliver materials to disaster areas. Allowing the large charities to purchase food, water, diapers, paper products, and other disaster-sheltering materials from such local retail sources helps the affected area restart the local economy and provide jobs to disaster victims.

For example, right after Hurricane Katrina, Walmart sent staff members to every mass care center looking for its employees. It provided an immediate cash gift to each, and then assured them that as soon as they were ready to return to work there was a job waiting for them. For Walmart employees whose usual places of employment had been destroyed, there were jobs in other open stores, in distribution centers, or with Walmarts disaster response effort.

Those sales help reestablish a tax base for the devastated community. For example, in Waveland, Mississippi, the Lowes store was the only source of sales tax revenue for more than a year. All the money could be used effectively, as shelter managers determine exactly what wass neededbottles of water, diapers, and moreand apply all the gifts to exactly what the victims need rather than inappropriate items that go to the landfill.

After the tsunami, an Indonesian community from Silicon Valley modeled modern donations management by holding several social event fundraisers that emphasized the need for cash donations rather than goods. Dancing, singing, martial arts displays, and auctions resulted in more than $250,000 in cash donations to one local Red Cross chapter.

The British princes William and Harry organized a polo match that raised $50,000 for tsunami relief. The India Development and Relief Fund accepted donations through PayPal, while 17 million Americans used the Internet to donate to tsunami relief, according to the Pew Foundation. One nonprofit leader noted that people get their news online and then, in disasters, respond to the immediacy of the event with an online donation.

Influence Behavior with Pre-Disaster Education

American communities can use their sphere of influence to educate residents about the benefits of cash donations. During disasters, local government media messages can emphasize charitable donations and suggest local charities active in disaster relief.

During a disaster that affects a local community, the consistent message should be a request for cash donations to the charities that are providing disaster relief to the community. The donors can receive a tax break, and the victims can get the exact supplies they need. Leaders in the nonprofit community have emphasized the importance of teaching people that unsolicited donations are not a gift but a burden and a waste of resources.

A citys webmaster can create a disaster donations page in advance that emphasizes the need for cash donations and the importance of not sending goods. The page should include links to recognized disaster relief organizations such as the American Red Cross. The link to the page can be visible on the citys homepage only when disasters occur.

Educate the Media

The media often serve as a stimulus for people to donate to disaster victims. Therefore, it is important for emergency managers and public information officers to work with local media outlets before a disaster to provide education about emergency plans and community needs. For example, during the response to Katrina the media emphasized the needs of the people in the New Orleans Superdome, leaving watchers with the impression that the entire community was inundated and marooned, when in fact less than 20 percent of the community residents had remained in the city after the evacuation order was issued. The fact that there were 50,000 MREs stored in the Superdome before the disaster was not reported by the media, but CNN did feature its reporter and his spouse distributing individual bottles of water to people from the back of their SUV.

Before a disaster, the emergency manager and public information officer should offer tours of the emergency operations center to media representatives. They should share the outline of a disaster response in the community, including chains of command and roles of government and non-profit agencies. The need for cash donations during a disaster can be included in the briefing to lay the groundwork for post-disaster cooperation between the local government and the media.

The local governments emergency operations plan should include pre-made messages in multiple languages. These messages should emphasize that the community cannot manage unsolicited goods, and that all donations should be given in cash to a recognized charity

working in the area.

Initial messages can suggest donations to the American Red Cross, which always provides mass care and shelter services, while later messages can include other groups that have come to help, such as the Southern Baptist Mens organization that provides hot meals from its barbeque truck and Habitat for Humanity that helps with repairs of homes.

Educate Leaders

Government-elected and appointed leaders should receive media training in advance of a disaster. A confident response to the media is essential to calm the community. Immediately after the 9/11 attacks in New York City, Mayor Rudy Giuliani made frequent televised reports to the community, assuring the listeners that he was in charge and that community resources were being effectively directed to the disaster response. The result was a calming effect on the community.

Contrast this with information disseminated by both Mayor Ray Nagin and the New Orleans chief of police about crime waves that turned out to be untrue. The need for community leaders to provide only confirmed information to the media, and to speak in a confident way, is a key to success in all aspects of disaster response.

Outpourings of national and international goodwill at the time of a disaster can be a burden if the result is an influx of unsolicited material goods. The outpouring of cash donations can facilitate the care and shelter of victims. The plans and actions of government leaders in advance of disasters, and in response to disasters, can create the desired outcome of cash donations directed to recognized charities.