Local American Red Cross advises on item donations

The American Red Cross of Imperial Valley received and hefty anonymous donation this morning.

Though they are extremely grateful for the contribution, they want to make the community aware of the type of donations in need and what services they provide.

News 11’s Nico Payne spoke to volunteers today and brings us more.

“What we’re looking for right now is, we’re looking more for monetary donations. One of the main reasons that were looking for monetary donations is because we are sending volunteers out to the Texas area as well as the Florida area to help prepare for Hurricane Irma,” said Jose Ortega, local disaster program manager, American Red Cross.

The problem with item donations is that there is not enough storage space and it takes the local volunteers away from training and relief efforts.

“Unfortunately we dont have the warehousing space, we dont have the personnel. We are trying to bring as many of the perishable items inside our office so we can make sure that they don’t go bad, but unfortunately everything else, we are looking for partners that might be able to take it out to Houston,” explained Ortega.

The American Red Cross is working with other local organizations to try and get the donated items where they are intended to be, but item donations are not usually accepted.

“We are going to try and give as many of the products as possible to the organizations that can ship this items out but if we can’t find somebody then we have to donate them here locally,” said Ortega.

Right now the main focus is trying to get shelter volunteers trained and ready to help with relief efforts.

“Here locally were focused on getting volunteers trained up, even local community members so they can become shelter workers. Once they become the shelter worker, were looking at deploying them so they can help us out,” added Ortega.

“We are looking to add more classes for people who are interested in taking the classes so they can be deployed,” said Karen Martinez, American Red Cross Volunteer.

People can also dial 2-1-1 to get more information on where and how to donate items.