FILE - Dwayne Johnson attends the world premiere of"Black Adam" in New York on Oct. 12, 2022, left, and Oprah Winfrey appears at the Essence Festival of Culture in New Orleans on June 30, 2023. The nonprofit Entertainment Industry Foundation says the People's Fund of Maui, which was started by Winfrey and Johnson to benefit survivors of the wildfires last summer, has given away almost $60 million over six months to 8,100 adults.
In the end, the Entertainment Industry Foundation, a longtime nonprofit that helps celebrities administer charitable work and that managed the distribution of the funds, said it raised almost $60 million. That money was dispersed between September and February to some 8,100 adults — a significant portion of the 12,000 people the state of Hawaii estimates were displaced.
Over many years, the disaster response community has grown to trust direct cash transfers like these as a very useful tool, said Shannon Doocy, a professor at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. Despite initial fears of misuse, she said, research has shown cash transfers overwhelmingly benefit the intended recipients who spend it on essentials like housing and food.
Vierra's family has tried to save all the money they've received, including from a GoFundMe that family members set up, direct gifts strangers sent to her daughter’s Venmo account and a gift from a fundraiser Fox News host Will Cain started. They will need that money — and more — to rebuild, though those plans are still very distant.that were set up immediately after the fires.
The foundation followed a disaster response plan it had crafted in 2019, in anticipation of a possible catastrophic event. It has paid out $89 million in grants so far, purposefully directing the majority of its support toward recovery and stabilization efforts which will extend over months and years. This is the work that direct cash transfers won't address, including providing services, strengthening social support systems and rebuilding with the next potential disaster in mind.
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