Red Cross assistance will be by appointment soon

Lines at the American Red Cross NMI chapter office were not as bad yesterday as they were in prior days. This is because the 250 individuals to be processed yesterday were given numbers ahead of time. This was also what they did for today.

However, succeeding days will no longer be like that but by appointment only, according to ARC service delivery site manager Mary Anderson.

“Starting Saturday, everything’s going to be by appointment. We’re not handing out numbers anymore,” Anderson said, “We don’t want these lines anymore.”

According to Anderson, they will be opening up a call center that will be able to handle all calls coming into and out from the Red Cross.

Through that they will be setting up appointments per individual to come to their chapter office in Airport Road.

“We’re asking people that haven’t registered to call in, give us their name, their phone number, and their address. When they give us their phone numbers, we’re going to return their call and say ‘here’s when you have an appointment, can you make it at this time, on this day?’” Anderson said.

“If you call and have given us your name and number, hang tight for a little longer, we’re going to call you back,” she added.

Anderson said they will also remind people what to bring like identification cards so that they come prepared.

Patience
ARC is looking at 350 appointments a day but they will also try to increase that number depending on how the process goes.

“We’ll see if we can ramp it up to a few more and get as many people in here every day as we can until we’ve seen the very last person,” Anderson said.

Right now ARC has about 16 caseworkers working on their site to talk to people one on one. They also have teams out in the community to see clients who really can’t get to the chapter office themselves.

Asked about people who registered as early as last week and are still waiting for a call from the organization, Anderson said they are doing their best to prioritize them.

“We’re merging them all into one database and we’re trying to do them as by when we got them,” Anderson said. “We’re doing our best to make sure that the first called are the first served.”

Anderson also asked members of the public seeking assistance to be patient.

“Just be a little more patient with us and we’re going to do everything in our power to get to them,” she said.

Not leaving
ARC also assured the public that everyone who needs assistance will get assistance.

“I can guarantee, we are not leaving until we’ve seen everybody that has need,” Anderson said. “As long as we need to be here, we will be here.”

Once an individual or head of household is done with casework, Red Cross will be giving them client assistance cards with some money for fuel, phone, and laundry as well as tarps, water, buckets, hygiene supplies, food, and other supplies.

Anderson said that financial assistance is based on the needs of the affected person.

To register with ARC, call 234-3459.