How to Help LA

Title: How to Help LA

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Brigid Bergin: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC, and to end the show today, we're going to be talking about how we can help the folks in Los Angeles who have been dealing with all the destruction from the fires since January 7th. We might be far away, but this city certainly has faced its own calamities, and so many of us have friends and family in Southern California who may even be staying with us right now, so let's talk about how to best help with our guest, Elise Hu, a journalist and podcaster in LA, whose work you might have heard this week on NPR. Welcome to the show, Elise. Thanks so much for joining us.

Elise Hu: Thank you for having me.

Brigid Bergin: If you could tell us, how are you doing in the midst of this crisis for your city?

Elise Hu: Yes, thanks for asking. Well, physically well, and I'm under a roof, but this is a horribly disorienting time for the entire community, so I'm kind of just shell-shocked. Everybody in LA knows somebody who lost everything because of the scale and the scope of this disaster. It's so wide, it's so far-reaching, so it's been a rough start to the year for LA, but at the same time, in a lot of the worst of the crises we've encountered as humans, we see the best of humanity, and that's really warmed me so far in this, gosh, over a week now that we've been having to deal with these disasters.

Brigid Bergin: Yes, it's truly an awful start to the year. Listeners, we want to hear from you as well if you found good ways to help. What pressing needs are you hearing about from friends and family in LA? You can call or text us at 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. Elise, just to start, where do things stand now with the fires? I've read that the winds have subsided-

Elise Hu: Yes.

Brigid Bergin: -but may come back, but the fires are still active threat to populated areas, are there still evacuation orders in place?

Elise Hu: So many people are still evacuated. Now, fire crews have gotten the upper hand on two of the major fires that you've probably heard about a lot, the Eaton Fire in the east and the Palisades Fire in the west. They are increasingly contained, but they've done so much damage already and at least 80,000 people are still evacuated, and a lot of that has to do with how hazardous these burned-out neighborhoods still may be.

There are still search and rescue operations going on in the neighborhoods, and power has also been shut off in a lot of the evacuation zones for safety reasons, so a lot of folks are still displaced and staying in different parts of town, or with friends and loved ones, or have left town completely for now.

Brigid Bergin: If people want to help, where should they start? The lists of organizations involved are quite long. There's of course a group like the Red Cross. What's their role? Is that an organization you would recommend people, turn to if they want to give support to people who are dealing with these fires?

Elise Hu: If you are not physically in Los Angeles and not able to volunteer, for example, the best way to help is with financial donations. There are, like you mentioned, a lot of organizations out there raising funds, and traditional OG aid organizations like the Red Cross certainly have a lot of experience coming into disaster zones, assisting with manpower and supplies.

They're running evacuation centers. The Red Cross is on the ground here, and you can certainly support their efforts. They are part of the aid here in Los Angeles County. Visit redcross.org for more information. Otherwise, other organizations that you can-- that I have been recommending to folks are World Central Kitchen, which helps after disasters all over the world. The Pasadena Humane Society, which has been kind of the main animal shelter and animal organization that has helped temporarily shelter so many of the evacuated pets.

The LA Regional Food bank is great, and then also here locally, I really love the work of Altadena Girls. An 8th grader actually started it because so many of her friends and classmates saw their houses just burned to the ground, and so she is raising money and running a store for supplies for teen girls, clothing and skin care and just the comforts that teen girls need because there have been so many people affected in her own community.

Brigid Bergin: Listeners, we want to hear from you. We know some of you have already done things to help our friends, family, neighbors who live across the country. Give us a call and tell us what you've heard or what you're hearing. The number is 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. You can call or text. Elise, it's fascinating to hear some of these groups that are springing up to respond directly to the moment. It makes me think of the mutual-aid groups that made such an impact during the worst of the COVID pandemic.

Elise Hu: Yes.

Brigid Bergin: Are you seeing some of that happening as well in specific communities?

Elise Hu: Oh, absolutely. The mutual aid here in Los Angeles has really been tremendous to watch. There's spreadsheets where individuals who need things are posting, "Hey, I'm a family of four," for example, who needs housing with X amount of bedrooms, or there's folks-- and you can match with folks with things to give. There's separate tabs where you have people offering what they have to help. You can offer to volunteer on Mutual Aid. You can offer your car or truck or your spare room. Folks are contacting each other directly when they see potential matches.

There's a lot of mutual aid going on here in Los Angeles. When I talked about how you're seeing really the best of humanity, a lot of that mutual aid is really quite heartwarming to see, and of course, we should also mention there's platforms, right? There's always the online fundraising platforms like GoFundMe, and these are platforms where you can post a fundraiser for yourself or for your loved ones to raise through the platform, and obviously, GoFundMe, it takes a transaction fee for which your donors can offer to pay, but GoFundMe has now created a centralized hub for all of the verified online fundraising pages that are related to the Southern California wildfires.

There's a trust and safety team that's updating that hub with new verified campaigns if you're wanting to give directly to families or individuals.

Brigid Bergin: When you mentioned that verified, to me, that sounds like it's good advice for people who are concerned about avoiding scams.

Elise Hu: Of course.

Brigid Bergin: New York's Attorney General Letitia James issued a warning to do some research before giving that money, which is actually quite depressing, but of course, there are people who see this as an opportunity to make a buck. Are there any other things that you advise our listeners to be mindful of before they decide to give that money?

Elise Hu: Yes, I'm glad you brought this up because Cal Fire just said this morning, the fire responders in California, the organization called Cal Fire, which is the state fire crews, they said there is a social media scam going on right now asking for donations to Cal Fire, so please be careful and check as much as you can and verify these sources, and those organizations that are getting sort of scammed or there's folks that are pretending to be those organizations, they have been very quick to say, "Hey, this isn't us, and look out for that."

There are also a lot of social media warnings right now about duplicate benefits and FEMA money. That's because by law FEMA can't duplicate benefits that people receive from another source, so there's a lot of warnings about treading carefully if you are giving to GoFundMe, or if you're asking, if you're running an online fundraiser, because we don't want these families to not be able to receive FEMA funding as well or FEMA disaster relief funds.

Brigid Bergin: Can you just clarify, if they are getting these GoFundMe funds, does that affect their other potential support funds?

Elise Hu: Only if you are listing on GoFundMe specific disaster-related expenses. If I'm starting a GoFundMe, and I'm saying something like, "This will pay to go for home repairs," then your FEMA funding cannot go to pay for home repairs, and so you could risk being denied for FEMA funding for the exact same expense. The bottom line is just getting help from government agencies after a disaster can, as we know from folks who have had to do this, can be a lengthy process, and so a lot of families are turning to more immediate assistance through platforms like GoFundMe, and that can fill the gaps, but just having to navigate the specific ask is what is being warned about.

Brigid Bergin: I want to go to Jim in Spring Lake, New Jersey. Jim, you have just about 30 seconds to shout out the organization you wanted to let listeners know about.

Jim: Sure. The organization is the Global Empowerment Mission. They were featured this morning on Good Morning America. I've worked in disaster zones here in the United States and internationally, worked in refugee camps. I've deployed with the Global Empowerment Mission. They are one of the most effective and efficient organizations, especially in situations like this, to get direct aid out to people.

They've got a warehouse that they've built out in the last 48 hours that is completely filled with aid, and they are getting it out into neighborhoods right now. They've partnered up with Bethenny Frankel from the BStrong Foundation. They're just a really great organization. Michael, the founder and director, is a friend of mine, and he just does incredible work in disaster zones and war zones all around the world, so again--

Brigid Bergin: Jim, thank you so much for shouting out the Global Empowerment Mission. We appreciate that. We're going to have to leave it there for now. I want to thank my guest Elise Hu, whose reporting you can hear on NPR. She's also the host of the TED Talks Daily podcast and co-host of the podcast Forever35. Thank you. Good luck to you as you live through and report on this crisis.

Elise Hu: Thank you so much.

Brigid Bergin: The Brian Lehrer Show's producers are Lisa Allison, Mary Croke, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond, and Esperanza Rosenbaum. Megan Ryan is the head of Live Radio. Juliana Fonda and Milton Ruiz are at the studio controls. I'm Brigid Bergin. This is the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Thanks for listening, everybody. Have a great weekend. Stay tuned for All Of It.

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