Apartment coalition, Red Cross team up for disaster relief

Friday, Nov. 15, 2002 | 5:53 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION November 16, 2002

An apartment complex fire can be devastating to many people, even if firefighters quickly contain the blaze to just a couple of units.

"The entire building -- six to eight or more apartments -- is determined to be uninhabitable because the power and gas to all units are shut off," said David Bauman, chairman of the Southern Nevada Multi-Housing Association.

"So, unlike a house fire, you have a number of families that have to be assisted, not just the one or two that are burned out."

Last year the American Red Cross of Southern Nevada, a private nonprofit, provided more than $250,000 in disaster assistance to 1,300 victims of local fires -- the majority of them apartment residents.

Faced with so many in need, the Red Cross and the apartment association, which represents more than 50,000 apartment owners, managers and residents, have joined forces to create the Southern Nevada Multi-Housing Disaster Relief Fund.

The fund will be administered by the Red Cross specifically to assist apartment dwellers left homeless by fires and other disasters.

The program also is designed to educate people about the misconceptions of apartment fires and about what the Red Cross does in responding to such disasters."

"It is not just handing out blankets and finding shelter for victims," Ted Zidenberg, disaster services coordinator for the local Red Cross, said.

"We do everything from giving people instructions on how to clean their smoke-damaged furniture to get them mental health professionals to help them deal with loss of life and even pay for funerals."

The Red Cross responds to an average of 240 incidents a year and spends about $800 per family per disaster.

The apartment group hopes to one day provide $250,000 a year in funding for the relief program.

Before the Nevada Apartment Association and Silver State Apartment Association merged recently to form the Southern Nevada Multi-Housing Association, their charitable efforts were spread to an number of groups, including the Red Cross.

With the merger, the organizations are pooling their philanthropic resources to support just one charity.

"We chose the Red Cross because this relief program will directly benefit our association members and our tenants," said Kathy Miller, vice president of the apartment association.

Trish Williamson, spokeswoman for the local Red Cross, said, "The SNMA's support is critical to our relief efforts." She said the money raised specifically to help apartment dwellers will free up funds for other programs.

"This fund will enable us to better address our Hometown Response Ready project (to prepare Nevadans for terrorism and disasters), our HIV program, CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) and other programs."

In addition to defraying the Red Cross' expenses on disaster relief, Bauman said the program will focus on:

Bauman said his organization represents 400 properties with an occupancy of 90 percent to 92 percent, which means about 6,000 units are vacant at any one time. He says a network can be established to place victims in those units that would be furnished and set aside to use for emergency tenant services.

The program also would allow tenants displaced by fire to forgo credit history checks and cleaning and security deposits if they are relocated to a different association-sponsored apartment complex after the disaster.

And the organization, as well as the Red Cross, has agreements to place disaster victims in small kitchenette rentals. That, however, can be expensive. The Red Cross notes it pays Budget Suites $350 for a week of disaster placement. Area hotels cost a lot more.

Miller said much of the problem can be eliminated with relatively inexpensive apartment insurance.

"We are really going to push for educating our tenants on the importance of insurance," she said. "When I ran an apartment complex, I provided insurance as a move-in incentive. Not only did it help my tenants, my property liability premiums significantly went down."

The reason apartment insurance is of interest to the Red Cross is that policies generally carry a "cost of additional living expenses" clause, which reimburses people for emergency expenses associated with disasters. Thus, the insured do not need the Red Cross to get them emergency shelter or pay for it.

Williamson said one of the questions response team members ask victims of apartment disasters is whether they have insurance, and "the answer hardly ever is yes."

Estimates of the percentage of apartment dwellers without insurance range from 75 percent to 85 percent, depending on whom you ask.

The Insurance Information Institute says 25 percent of apartment residents nationwide have apartment insurance compared to 96 percent to 97 percent of homeowners nationwide, who must have insurance to gain financing for their homes.

Miller and Bauman said neither apartment association members who pay dues of about $1.25 per unit per year, nor apartment renters will be charged any additional fees to fund the Red Cross relief efforts.

"We want to encourage everyone from our owners to our tenants to get involved in other ways," Bauman said. "They can volunteer at the Red Cross. We also want our vendors -- carpet layers, air conditioning specialists, painters, etc., -- to become involved with our efforts."

Zidenberg says his organization can use new -- and diverse -- blood.

"Many of our volunteers are seniors and few are minorities," he said. "We want more diversity. We respond to fires where all of the adult victims speak only Spanish and none of us speaks anything but English.

"We end up talking to the very young victims who are bilingual so we can communicate with their parents that we are there to help them. We really need more Hispanic volunteers for our emergency response teams."

The apartment association in September held a golf tournament and silent auction that raised more than $3,000 in seed money for the relief fund. Other events will be held to bolster the fund, the association said.

However, such an amount can be quickly spent when it comes to a disasters. Zidenberg said in October the Red Cross made 27 local emergency responses, spending about $8,600 to help victims. In July, that figure was $25,000.