Los Angeles Responding Generously, Charities Say

The Rev. John Hunter could hardly contain his excitement Friday as a crew prepared to paint a modest house south of downtown that his church hopes will accommodate at least one family displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

“It’s a drop in the bucket, but it’s a start,” he said, surveying the work at the house around the corner from First African Methodist Episcopal Church on South Harvard Boulevard.

“If we set an example by doing this, fine,” he said. “The bottom line is this: We want to help some people reaching out for life.”

First AME wasn’t alone.

Across the city, churches, civic leaders, charitable organizations and businesses responded to the victims of devastated Gulf Coast states quickly and generously, representatives of several charities said Friday.

Spokesman Nick Samaniego said the American Red Cross of Greater Los Angeles had collected more than $1.5 million in fundraising this week at the Rose Bowl and Dodger Stadium and in Burbank.

“It’s been amazing, an outpouring of support,” he said. “You’ve got kids coming in to drop off their piggybanks, people writing $10,000 checks, and everything in between.”

The chapter will continue to collect donations at the Home Depot Center, 18400 Avalon Blvd. in Carson, from 4 to 8 p.m. Saturday, and at the Whittier Narrows Recreation Area, 823 Lexington-Gallatin Road in South El Monte, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.

Msgr. Gregory Cox, executive director of Catholic Charities of Los Angeles, said priests would ask parishioners during Mass this weekend to donate to a national fund for victims.

The nonprofit Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles has sent $100,000 of its own funds to the Gulf Coast. The Agape International Spiritual Center in Culver City sent $5,000 it raised during a special offering Tuesday night.

San Bernardino County began its fund drive Friday with a $5,000 donation.

On a smaller scale but equally heartfelt is an aid campaign organized by a group of dog lovers in Brentwood. Every week, Friends of Barrington Dog Park holds a “Lemonade Friday” as a social event at the park.

Spokesman Craig Copeland said the group got together Thursday night and created New Orleans-related ribbons for people to buy and wear, along with designer tank tops and T-shirts that say “My Dog Rocks.” The items were to go on sale last night, with and all proceeds to be used to help hurricane victims.

“This is a great, caring group of dog owners from all over L.A.,” Copeland said, “and we want to do what we can.”

In a Hollywood response to the disaster, actor Nicolas Cage, who has a residence in New Orleans, donated $1 million to the American Red Cross. Singeractress Hillary Duff pledged $200,000 to that organization and $50,000 to USA Harvest, which is providing food to shelters.

Elsewhere, donations were being taken at Krispy Kreme stores, Rite Aid drugstores, in the parking lots of Stater Bros. Supermarkets and at the Long Beach Water Treatment Plant, 2950 Redondo Ave.

With more than 19,000 employees in the MississippiLouisiana region’s shipping industry, Northrop Grumman Corp. of Los Angeles planned to contribute $2 million to the American Red Cross and a relief fund operated by the defense firm’s foundation, a spokesman said.

At First AME, workers spent Friday sprucing up the three-bedroom, wood-shingled house for a family of eight, which entertainer Arsenio Hall donated to the church in 1992.

Peggy Hill, First AME’s executive director of housing, expects to have as-yet-unidentified transplants settled in by next weekend.

“We’ll take care of them and all their needs for a year,” Hill said. “This will be a family in desperate need of peace and quiet to gather their thoughts.”

At the end of a year, Hunter said, “they may opt to restart their lives here in Los Angeles. In any case, they won’t have to worry about where their next meal is coming from, or whether they’ll have a roof over their heads.”

Times staff writer Ann M. Simmons contributed to this report.