Crossing Off the Red Cross --Stunning Report Shows Millions Wasted in Hurricane Sandy Aid
Crossing Off the Red Cross
17 Oct 29, 2014 8:27 AM EDT
By Barry Ritholtz
The American Red Cross has become a man-made disaster. It wasted millions of dollars in Hurricane Sandy aid through mismanagement and poor judgment. It compounded the problem by covering up its errors, hiring lawyers to prevent the public from finding out what happened to its donations.
Earlier this year, I expressed my disappointment in the Red Cross. It had raised $312 million for storm relief, but then stonewalled on how the money was spent.
This morning, we found out why. Thanks to the dogged investigation by Justin Elliott and Jesse Eisinger of ProPublica and Laura Sullivan of NPR, we learned how poorly the Red Cross responded to the Sandy disaster.
Their article "The Red Cross’ Secret Disaster" is must reading for anyone who contributes to philanthropies.
The details of how it botched the relief efforts are laid out in Red Cross documents and are simply stunning:
• Despite plenty of advance warning of Sandy, the Red Cross lacked basics such as food, blankets and batteries to distribute to victims after the storm.
• Red Cross workers weren't provided with the usual GPS devices. Many got lost driving around the New York area and were unable to deliver aid and supplies.
• As many as half of the emergency meals prepared for Sandy victims were wasted or never delivered.
• The Red Cross failed to deliver food, water, shelter, cleaning supplies, blankets to survivors of Sandy until weeks after the storm. Mormon and Amish volunteers, on the other hand, were delivering supplies just three days after the storm.
• Red Cross supervisors ordered dozens of empty trucks to be driven around, “just to be seen,” in lieu of delivering relief supplies.
• Emergency response vehicles and other assets were also diverted from disaster aid to be seen as backdrops at news conferences for PR purposes; the Red Cross did this after other storms too, including Hurricane Isaac.
Perhaps most damning is evidence that the Red Cross fabricated claims of how many people were actually served by the charity. The Red Cross said that “17 million meals and snacks were delivered, there were 74,000 overnight stays in shelters, more than 7 million relief items like blankets and flashlights.” Internal documents cast doubt on those numbers, saying the charity’s ability to actually count what was delivered was “crippled.”
[bThe Red Cross takes in more than $1 billion a year in donations, but seems to have lost the ability to manage that money.
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-10-29/crossing-off-the-red-cross
----------------------------------
ProPublica Documents: TRULY DISGUSTING READ....
http://s3.amazonaws.com/propublica/redcross/the-red-cross-secret-disaster.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
So many people could be helped with waste like this. My husband has had his suspicions about the Red Cross since he volunteered with the local Red Cross many years ago. Consequently, we have usually sought out other charities for our contributions (not that we can ever give enough).
I really never imagined this though 
(One wonders if she was just a bad match for a Disaster Relief Charity) 
The modern-day Red Cross was created by congressional charter more than a century ago and plays a unique part in responding to disasters. The iconic charity has a government mandate to work alongside the Federal Emergency Management Agency in relief efforts.
The Red Cross has endured patches of trouble in the recent past. It faced allegations of financial mismanagement after Sept. 11 and Hurricane Katrina and a series of chief executives were forced to resign. Congress forced an overhaul. The Red Cross recruited McGovern to the top job in 2008.
McGovern had spent her career as an executive at AT&T and Fidelity and was teaching marketing at Harvard Business School. “This is a brand to die for,” she said in an early interview as the Red Cross’ chief executive.
Indeed, the Red Cross remains a magnet for wealthy and corporate contributors, drawing more than $1 billion in donations last year, including at least $1 million each from Lady Gaga, Nicolas Cage and the oilman T. Boone Pickens.
When McGovern took the reins, she inherited a sprawling operation with hundreds of chapters across the country. The Red Cross has more than 26,000 employees. After a storm, the full-time staff mobilizes volunteers and a smaller corps of disaster relief experts, known as reservists.
While often praised as a stabilizing presence by those outside the Red Cross, McGovern initiated a series of changes inside the organization that roiled the venerable charity. She executed layoffs and reorganizations that closed local chapters and centralized power at national headquarters in Washington. In part, these changes reflected several years of operating in the red. In its most recent year, the Red Cross ran a $70 million budget deficit. “Fundraising fell short of our target in a year without any huge national disasters,” McGovern wrote in a September email to executives.
More at:
ProPublica Documents: TRULY DISGUSTING READ...
. http://s3.amazonaws.com/propublica/redcross/the-red-cross-secret-disaster.html
a friend in NOLA once told me that after Hurricane Betsy in the '60s, they sold bread. 
There's a History There of Raking in the Money for Disasters.....and nothing much is done but to "line folks pockets with ill gotten gains" on the Backs of National disasters.
