Like many of you, we are aghast at the scope of destruction that Hurricane Harvey is still wreaking on the Texas coast, even as I write this. We thought we’d come up with a list of things to do and places that will desperately need donations as Houston, Galveston, and the rest of the coast struggles to regain its footing.
Jia Tolentino (@jiatolentino on twitter) has compiled a list:
Food banks in Galveston, Corpus Christi and Corpus Christi Food Pantry, and Houston.
There’s the Texas Diaper Bank (part of the National Diaper Bank network), which provides supplies for babies and adults in times of crisis. It’s one of those vital supplies that slip through the cracks a lot of the time.
The SPCA of Texas is providing services to animals that have been affected by the hurricane (no judgment of people who left their pets behind, please. We don’t know their stories).
Portlight is an organization that specifically helps disabled people locate services and resources. (And in less acute times, provides inclusive emergency management training, which is so desperately needed.)
The Coalition for the Homeless is coordinating shelters and organizations across the city.
The North American Mission Board and Southern Baptist Disaster Relief is on the ground now and intend to be there for months at least.
Heart to Heart International also does acute disaster response, including a mobile medical unit, and Samaritan’s Purse is ready to help with home recovery.
I saw a number of people on twitter recommending Global Giving, they’re hoping to raise $2 Million. (In the interests of full disclosure, it looks like they plan to distribute these donations to local organizations, and I don’t know if this is any better than sending money to those organizations directly.)
Andrea Grimes of Traitor Radio has a post up on their Patreon of many of these organizations and others, and other places to can contact to volunteer if you’re in the area. (Also a bonus “Don’t say Texas had this coming” rant, which is accurate.)
Also, shelters and food banks in other Texas cities that took in refugees are going to need help- Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth, and San Antonio (Maybe also Waco? College Station? I’m looking at maps here).
In the midst of all this tragedy and horror, we can remember what Mr. Roger’s told us, and what his mother told him: Look for the helpers.
Dear God some people give me such hope:
REPORTER: What are you going to do?
HERO: I'm gonna save some lives.pic.twitter.com/Qj2nmvCD97
— Mikel Jollett (@Mikel_Jollett) August 27, 2017
If you are in the path of the storm, stay safe, our thoughts are with you, and please let us know what you need. If you are volunteering to help, thank you. There will be countless opportunities to volunteer in the weeks and months and honestly, probably years to come. Several months after Katrina, some friends of mine drove down to the Gulf Coast with a jeep full of building supplies, found a work camp, and made themselves useful for a week.
There’s going to be so much to do, big and small. If you have other suggestions, please, leave them in the comments. This community is so giving and so kind, we can help each other and come out the other side. We’re all helpers, here.
UMCOR (United Methodist Committee on Relief) is the disaster response arm of the Methodist Church. I know some people might feel unsure about donating to a religious organization, but 100% of what you donate to UMCOR goes to relief efforts for the disaster you designate. I worship at a Methodist church–and we already had “Flood Buckets” in the narthex yesterday ready for parishioners to fill with supplies for donation. (Full disclosure: I live in southeastern Louisiana; we’ve both donated to and been the recipient of disaster relief.) I guarantee that some of the first non-governmental relief response we’ll see as the flood waters abate will be from UMCOR and area Methodist churches.
Everyone in the area, please stay safe.
http://www.umcor.org
In addition to SPCA, Austin Pets Alive has taken in hundreds of animal evacuees from local shelters along the Gulf coast prior to Harvey making landfall and they expect many more once the roads open up in the hardest hit areas.
From the APA website- “Thanks to the overwhelming amount of in-kind donations over the past few days, we have had so many donations brought to us that we are running out of room to store them. However, we know that we will continue to need more and more supplies as we care for animals over the next few weeks. By providing a financial donation, you will allow us to ensure that we can purchase the supplies that we need, when we need them. It will also help us provide the best possible care for the new animals that we are taking in, as the intake process alone will cost over $20,000.”
https://www.austinpetsalive.org/hurricane-harvey-evacuations/
Thank you for posting the link to the diaper bank. Diapers and wipes along with tampons and pads are often overlooked when people donate. Also toilet paper, toothpaste and brushes, baby soap, travel shampoo, etc are necessities in an emergency and get used up quickly.
I can confirm that the Austin and San Antonio food banks are running special campaigns right now because of Harvey. If anyone is in Texas or surrounding states, I would check with your local food bank to see if they are doing a special campaign.
Information from High Plains Food Bank, Amarillo, TX
“Hurricane Harvey relief efforts:
Mon, Aug 28, 2017
#HurricaneHarvey relief update
from Feeding Texas CEO, Celia Cole:
Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley was not affected by Hurricane Harvey and is in contact with Food Bank of
Corpus Christi and Food Bank of the Golden Crescent in Victoria to see how they can help.
Food Bank of Corpus Christi – opened today. Their facility received some damage…some roof
leaks, water in the warehouse and refrigeration problems, but they are operational.
Shelter response: No shelter report requests at this time
Food Bank of the Golden Crescent most of their staff evacuated or was unable (to make it to
work) today, so Robin staffed the food bank. The food bank is without electricity and running on
a backup generator.
Shelter response: Responding to request to feed 230 people at a American Red Cross
shelter in Cuero
Houston Food Bank closed early yesterday so that their staff could safely get home. They were
unable to get back to the food bank due to the flooding in Houston.
Shelter response: There is 1 person staying at the food bank to support city and county
shelters today, via a high water vehicle provided by the city.”
I know it’s long, but it is informative.
@Michelle in Texas – thanks for sharing. Glad to see so much is still open and serving.
Worker bees, if you plan to donate to Hurricane Harvey relief, check into matching donations from your employer. My company matched my donation on its American Red Cross Houston flood relief campaign. Our high-tech crisis response team is in Texas and doing their magic. Volunteers in my rural community are already planning a “fill a truck” drive to send supplies and volunteers down to Texas after the storm moves on. The helpers are already at work ….
I’m in Houston, and I just wanted to say thanks for this post. What’s happening here is heart-breaking and unprecedented. In our part of the city, we’ve had two feet of rain since Friday night and we’re told to expect as much as that again before the storm is over. I can believe that–it’s pouring as I write this. Thanks for bringing attention to this disaster-in-progress.
Also, Amazon is matching donations to the Red Cross up to $1 million. https://www.amazon.com/l/16927356011
The Houston Food Bank is a fantastic organization. I’ve volunteered with them before, and I know they’ll use the donations they receive to do a good job of getting food where it needs to go.
The Texas Library Association runs a Disaster Relief Fund that you can donate to in order to help libraries affected by Harvey: http://www.txla.org/news/2017/08/disaster-relief-and-support-for-libraries
Also, children’s author Kate Messner has organized a series of auctions for children’s, MG, and YA authors to benefit American Red Cross efforts: http://www.katemessner.com/kidlit-cares-our-hurricane-harvey-relief-effort/
@LSUReader- prayers to you, your family, neighbors, friends, co-workers and the whole community there. Please stay safe!
Thank you for posting this, especially listing organizations that might be overlooked like Texas Diaper Bank.
My heart goes out to all those affected by this disaster.
Trying to do some donating tonight and seeing that at least a couple of these sites appear to be swamped. The Texas Diaper Bank site has an alert up saying it’s over its usage limit, but I was able to give a donation to the Houston Food Bank on a second attempt.
Noting this in case others are seeing the websites having troubles. Be patient and keep trying!
I know this is far from utmost in most people’s minds right now, but if I lost my library, I would be absolutely devastated. I look at the horrifying pictures on tv and feel for everyone, but I can’t help thinking of all the books and electronics that were destroyed as well. Maybe somewhere along the line there could be a place we could all send books and readers – I know I have a reader I no longer use that still works fine. Even a few minutes of escape into a good story might make someone’s harsh reality a little easier to bear.
Here’s a link with library related suggestions
https://bookriot.com/2017/08/28/hurricane-harvey-disaster-relief-library-edition/
Also the group called the Louisiana Cajun Navy, a volunteer group that provides water rescues- they could use donations for fuel & supplies
http://www.louisianacajunnavy.org/ and
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/LaCajunNavy/about/?ref=page_internal
I’m in Clear Lake (close to NASA) and so grateful for this post. You all are a wonderful community. We have had about 50 inches of rain already and it is still raining. Many people here will need help in the coming days. We are helping our neighbors as much as we can, but seeing people outside our area and state coming forward to offer help really gives us comfort right now. Thank you!!!
according to a friend of mine who is a Houston-area local, Samaritan’s Purse is connected to Joel Osteen. Those who find him objectionable might want to consider making their donations elsewhere.
One more suggestion, from my Houston-area local friend, Ruth Holloway, quoted verbatim from her FB page.
“Historically, transgender, intersex, and genderqueer people get even less help in times of disaster: some shelters simply will not accept our presence or will misgender us, some churches will turn us away from disaster relief, some of us do not have adequate identity documents to get help from FEMA or state government, and on and on it goes. Plus, we often lose access to good medical care–if we have it in the first place!–while our doctors are tied up with dealing with the disaster, prescriptions get lost, etc. Add to that the fact that right now, our state has been trying to pass laws to encourage discrimination and violence against us, and one of the deadly side effects of Harvey just got deadlier.
Houston has a *large* transgender population, many of whom have doubtless lost everything. The Transgender Foundation of America has set up a Trans Disaster Relief Fund, to help my trans brothers and sisters who are hurting, and for whom other recovery avenues may not be available. It will also provide for burial expenses, if necessary, for brothers and sisters who have lost their lives in this storm. In your disaster-relief giving, please consider giving a portion to this fund.”
http://www.tfahouston.com/all-catagories/news/trans-relief-fund/
(long-time site reader here, I had a login back in 2009 but don’t see where to enter it so oh well!)
https://operationbbqrelief.org/
Another organization that can use donations and/or volunteers is Operation BBQ Relief. “Combining our skills as competition cooks, caterers and chefs to provide meals to those affected and first responders of disasters in the United States.”
Think dozens of competition BBQ rigs and catering food trucks cooking around the clock, and dozens of volunteers then prepping and distributing it. The smell is *amazing*
They’ve set up multiple feeding stations and in the first two days served up almost 40,000 meals as they get things rolling. Today was looking like it might be 35,000 meals which would be a new daily record.
Statistics on what it took to put out 39,300 meals Day 1+Day 2 for Houston+Victoria:
16,795 Pounds of Raw Pork
1965 #10 Cans of Vegetables
1310 Full sized aluminum pans and lids
Blue Willow Bookshop, an independent bookstore in Houston, has organized a campaign to provide books to shelters and libraries in the area affected by Harvey. To donate:
http://www.bluewillowbookshop.com/hurricane-harvey-relief