Charities deserve a break -- if they apply lessons

One year ago, after Hurricane Katrina savaged New Orleans and its outlying areas, it became de rigueur to criticize everyone in the disaster relief business, including America's charities, for their inability to literally deliver the goods. However, after seeing the damage and speaking with donors, charities and recipients alike, I'm not convinced that lumping the Red Cross or the Salvation Army with FEMA was fair.

No charity will ever be well positioned, with its small staffing and volunteer labor, to handle such an event. The New Orleans Red Cross chapter office was destroyed in the floods. Nearly half of the office's employees lost their homes, and two of them lost family members. And still we screamed at them, from the safety of our dry offices half a continent away, to do their jobs faster and better than before, in conditions no one could imagine.

In reality, charities in and around New Orleans did a ton of good. Residents were evacuated; meals were served; cash assistance was provided; counseling was given; and the community is slowly being rebuilt, largely on the backs of donor dollars and volunteer labor.

Were errors made? They were, but in most cases, they were errors of commission, not omission. Charities tried hard, but in many cases were overwhelmed by the conditions they faced. Yet, as I see no evidence that our government will do a better job next time to protect our citizens than it did in Louisiana, it is imperative that charities learn from their own mistakes and apply the following lessons to the next disaster relief efforts.

Stick with What You Do Best: Following the tsunami earlier that year, I was impressed by the number of groups that realized they were not in a position to aid the victims and subsequently referred their donors to other charities. Unfortunately, we didn't see enough of this with Katrina. Moving forward, charities should follow Warren Buffett's recent example: Recognize when others have the infrastructure in place to do better work and defer to them.

Imagine the Unimaginable: The night before Katrina hit land, the Red Cross was able to get thousands of meals into Baton Rouge, just 70 miles away. They were out of the path of the hurricane and slated to be sent into New Orleans as soon as it was safe. The executive director of the New Orleans chapter told me recently that, in hindsight, it "might as well have been on the moon." The food was worthless to them, because no one ever imagined every road in the region would be flooded. Next time, we must imagine not just the most likely scenarios, but also the worst-case scenarios.

Learn From Katrina, But Remember Next Time Will Be Different: We must not be "generals fighting the last war." This happened after 9/11, when many charities implemented pay-as-you-go disaster policies, in which funds for each disaster relief operation had to be raised specifically for each event. While this satisfied some untrusting donors, it created an untenable situation when Hurricane Rita followed Katrina just four weeks later, and the non-profits were powerless to shift Katrina funds to Rita's relief efforts. The next disaster will not be another New Orleans hurricane but an earthquake in Seattle or a tornado in Omaha, and we must not make new rules, based on Katrina, that hamstring us.

Put Aside Differences and Work Together: In the days after Katrina, the Red Cross took a lot of heat for an inability to "play well with others," which I found to be partially true in New Orleans. That being said, when other charities say the Red Cross doesn't "partner" with them, it usually means the Red Cross won't write them a check they can spend as they see fit. Charities that want to "partner" with the Red Cross (and most should) would be served by picking up the phone and explaining to them why the partnership would allow both groups to better serve their communities.

I get paid to criticize charities for a living. But in the case of Hurricane Katrina, I think much of the criticism we've heard is unfair. Most of the charities that signed on to help the people of New Orleans worked with passion and purpose, under unbelievable conditions. We owe them our thanks. And in return, those charities must learn from their mistakes and do all they can to correct them, for the sake of the victims of the next disaster.

Trent Stamp is executive director of Charity Navigator; www.charitynavigator.org.

Soundoff (Read 4 comments)
Tell us what's on your mind.

Add P-I Opinion headlines to