Red Cross Plans Wider Spending for Quake Relief

The Red Cross promised Tuesday to spend the entire $52.5 million donated for earthquake relief in Northern California, after recent public criticism from San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos over its plans to use the money for future disasters elsewhere.

“We needed to take some action to re-establish good faith with our donors, to keep the trust and confidence with them,” said Barbara Lohman, a spokesman for the American Red Cross regional office in Burlingame.

The 109-year-old, nonprofit international relief organization has spent $12.1 million on emergency relief for the 100-mile stretch of Northern California devastated by the 7.1-magnitude quake on Oct. 17.

The agency had promised to spend only another $10 million on long-term rebuilding programs, contending there had not been a demonstrated need for using the rest of the money here.

Agnos, just one of the area’s mayors applying for funds, had sought at least $10 million from the Red Cross, much of it to meet the needs of homeless people, some of whom were ousted from the hotels that serve as the city’s emergency shelters.

But Red Cross officials had suggested most of the remaining $30.4 million donated to the Northern California Earthquake Relief Fund could end up in a general disaster account administered in Washington.

Agnos had chided the Red Cross for considering taking that money out of Northern California, which sustained from $7 billion to $10 billion in damage from the largest quake here since the 1906 Great Earthquake.

In a series of public speeches, Agnos charged the agency with having a “horse-and-buggy kind of philosophy. They come into town and provide tents, blankets, coffee and doughnuts.”

At a news conference Tuesday, Agnos said the Red Cross’ decision would “keep the faith” of people from around the world who donated to the earthquake relief effort.

“There’s a lot of unmet needs here. . . . We’ve been saying spend this money on those who need it rather than putting it in the bank for the next disaster,” the mayor said.

The $12 million the Red Cross already has spent has gone to supply food, clothing, emergency rents and medical aid, Lohman said.

Several million dollars worth of other supplies also have been provided by the Red Cross and will have to be paid for from the relief fund, Lohman added.

After the quake, the Red Cross set up 45 shelters, helping more than 14,000 families and providing 500,000 meals. The Red Cross still operates two shelters, one each in Oakland and San Francisco that serve a total of about 400 people.

The decision not to transfer earthquake funds out of the region was made over the weekend after discussions between George F. Moody, national chairman of the Red Cross, and the agency’s executive committee of its Board of Governors, a volunteer group that oversees Red Cross operations.

“The foremost reason is that this earthquake was not the last disaster that’s going to hit here, and in hopes of maintaining the integrity of our donations process to meet the needs of the bigger (future) quake, which we all know is coming, we decided we needed to do this,” Lohman said.

She added that the Red Cross does not have a policy requiring it to use all donations designated for a specific disaster in those programs.

The extra $30 million will be used to fund proposals already submitted by officials of the quake-stricken areas, including the cities of San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Watsonville and Oakland.

Those funding requests were to be paid for with the $10 million set aside, which turned out to represent only a fraction of the total requested.

The allocations will be announced in mid-March.

Moody said any remaining money would be placed in a special account designated for future earthquake relief and preparedness in Northern California.

That could be used for such things as emergency response vehicles, stockpiling emergency equipment like generators and supplies, and quake education and survival training.

“It is and always has been Red Cross policy to stay on the job in a disaster until the job is done and all victims are cared for,” Moody said in a prepared statement.

“In the case of the Northern California earthquake, an unprecedented outpouring of generosity by people all over the country may make it possible for us to go even further to help prepare Northern Californians for any future disasters.”