How help is getting to the victims of the LA wildfires
Marketplace Morning Report
Marketplace
4.5 • 927 Ratings
🗓️ 14 January 2025
⏱️ 8 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In Los Angeles, the Federal Emergency Management Agency is opening assistance centers today to help those impacted by the area’s fires. But nonprofits have also stepped up, and many people have taken to crowdfunding — and raised millions in the process. We’ll hear more. Plus, we’ll map out how EV sales are doing around the globe, and we’ll learn about some of the struggles of taxi and rideshare drivers in China.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | What's the best way to get help to those who need it quickly? |
| 0:05.9 | From Marketplace, I'm Sabri Beneshore in for David Brancaccio. |
| 0:09.2 | In Los Angeles, the federal emergency management agencies opening up assistance centers today to help those impacted by the fires. |
| 0:16.7 | That help includes cash to buy clothes and other essential items. |
| 0:20.6 | But a lot of people have not been waiting. |
| 0:22.6 | They've already collectively raised millions of dollars online. |
| 0:26.9 | Marketplaces Nova Sappho takes a look at the challenges of getting aid to people quickly after a major disaster. |
| 0:32.9 | People affected by the LA fires have had the ability to apply for FEMA financial aid online, and |
| 0:39.1 | nonprofits have kicked into action on the ground. But those types of relief systems and support |
| 0:46.2 | systems, they just take a little bit more time. The layman is a spokesperson with GoFundMe. |
| 0:51.8 | And while people are filling out forms and nonprofits are helping with things such as temporary shelter, GoFundMe. And while people are filling out forms and nonprofits are helping with |
| 0:55.0 | things such as temporary shelter, GoFundMe has seen thousands of campaigns pop up over the last week |
| 1:00.8 | to get money in the hands of those affected. Lehman says those campaigns have raised at least |
| 1:06.4 | $100 million. That number continues to increase and we anticipate that to grow as damages are assessed as folks get back into communities. |
| 1:17.1 | One of those communities is Altadena, a historically black neighborhood partially destroyed by the fires. |
| 1:23.2 | The nearby nonprofit Pasadena Community Foundation is now pivoting its work to disaster relief. |
| 1:29.6 | But CEO Jennifer Deval says it's taken time to assess how best to disperse money to those in need. |
| 1:36.3 | Their foundation's goal is to get the first tranche of aid out by Friday. |
| 1:40.7 | The need is unimaginable, and the priorities for those needs are, you know, temporary shelter, food, emergency child care. |
| 1:50.1 | So why is so much of the response falling on nonprofits and individual donors? |
| 1:55.2 | It's by design, says Eric Stern. |
| 1:57.8 | He teaches at the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security, and Cybersecurity at the University at Albany. |
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