Red Hook Mutual Aid
This project has been retired and you can now find our donation page at tiny.cc/RHMAdonate.
Our website is redhookmutualaid.info - please join or support us!
About the project
This description applies to RHMA work from April 2020-September 2022.
To see what we're up to these days, visit redhookmutualaid.info or donate at tiny.cc/RHMAdonate!
We are a small corps of concerned Red Hookers who are working to make sure supplies, resources, and information are as inclusive, comprehensive, and accessible as possible to everyone in the neighborhood. Community need and our role within it is still evolving, and though we've met our donation goals, we are still fundraising to make new initiatives possible and have emergency funds on hand. Since a lot of the aid that was set up early on is waning, this is now more important than ever.
97% of all funds raised will go to families and individuals in need in Red Hook, and 3% will pay for the fees when we buy prepaid debit cards.
For weekly updates, subscribe to our newsletter at: tinyurl.com/redhookupdates
The Steps
Because of your donations, we have accomplished the following (so far):
- We set up a community phone line that can be used by multiple volunteers to field phone calls from anyone in Red Hook who needs info or to get enrolled in aid. We have about 50 contacts and we stay in good touch with them - mainly seniors living in public housing who don't have access to computers or the digital skills to find out about and get enrolled in aid - we do that for them. We made sure everyone in Red Hook knew about the phone line through direct mail postcards and flyers.
- We've delivered masks and hand sanitizer to each caller (sometimes multiple times), handmade here in Red Hook by Anne O'Neil and Van Brunt Distillery, respectively. In a few cases, we've done direct cash assistance for those who need it, totaling more than $500. We've also made financial contributions to the Red Hook organizations doing direct aid, like Red Hook Relief and the youth-led New BLQK Leaders (listen to this episode of This American Life!)
- We send out a newsletter every Saturday that gives updates for that week, useful to anyone who is not on Facebook every day, where most of the announcements are posted. We don't like being on Facebook every day, ourselves, but someone has to do it : )
- Most of our callers live in NYCHA housing, which is under massive construction right now to repair infrastructure damage done during Sandy, 8 years ago. 457 trees have been removed, leaving hardly any public space that is pleasant, and the water was shut off to buildings multiple times throughout the summer, sometimes on 90-degree days. Four times we delivered gallons of water to our callers who lived in affected buildings.
- We helped many of our contacts enroll in NYCHA's AC program, which did not deliver for the majority of them, at which point we purchased and delivered 15 ACs and brackets ourselves, installing them when necessary.
- Most recently, we made sure everyone was registered to vote and had applied for their absentee ballots - when necessary, we helped with that process.
Now we're thinking about hurricane season, and concerned about a lack of community discussion around emergency response, as well as the construction in NYCHA - another Sandy would be considerably more detrimental under these circumstances (compounded by Covid). Our plan at this point is to help our contacts plan out their emergency kit of items from this list, and we will offer to provide 3-5 of the items ourselves and deliver in the next few weeks.
Thank you again and again!
Why we‘re doing it
This is an outgrowth of existing relief efforts in the community, all of which have been largely digital in nature, i.e. people have to navigate websites, fill out Google Forms, check online calendars, etc. to access assistance, especially difficult for some folks with the Red Hook branch of Brooklyn Public Library closed due to COVID-19. For some people, that's a barrier to getting the assistance they need, and we know that the COVID crisis has meant serious job and financial losses, healthcare and housing concerns, stressors on mental health, and more for so many. There's so much out there, and our goal is to make that accessible and inclusive. This is a universal right, but specific to Red Hook as well, since many of our residents fell through the cracks following Sandy. We have learned from that experience, and strive to make sure it doesn't happen again.