Text-messaged donations swell Red Cross aid

A push by celebrities, athletes and the first lady encouraging text-message donations for earthquake relief in Haiti has contributed to a fundraising bonanza for the American Red Cross, which a little over a year ago was so strapped it turned to Congress for a bailout.

As of late Sunday, the organization had collected pledges of $103 million, about $22 million of which came through the text-messaging program. The NFL's promotion of text-message donations during its weekend playoff games produced stunning results, with money "coming in at the rate of $500,000 an hour," said Roger Lowe, a Red Cross spokesman.

The Red Cross is the biggest relief organization with a system in place to receive such donations, which are sent by cellphone to 90999 and billed at $10 each to the cellphone account. The total raised, a small part of which will be shared with other members of the Red Cross federation, puts it well ahead of other groups in fundraising for Haiti operations.

The contributions come despite well-publicized controversies over the Red Cross' performance and financial accountability after other major disasters.

After Hurricane Katrina in 2004, for example, representatives from the British, German, Colombian, Dutch and other international Red Cross organizations criticized their U.S. counterpart for inadequate planning, poor management of supplies and faulty record-keeping and logistics. And after the Sept. 11 attacks the organization struggled to deploy $1 billion in donations.

In almost every major disaster, the American Red Cross collects the lion's share of donations, in part because of its recognized brand name and its presence in communities throughout the country where small chapters are staffed by local volunteers.

"The Red Cross is simply the default group for donors when a disaster like this occurs," said Richard Walden, chief executive and founder of Operation USA, a relief organization based in Los Angeles that also is involved in the emergency response to the Haitian earthquake. Walden has been critical of the Red Cross' management of its money as well as its on-ground operations in the past.

The Red Cross is one of a handful of nonprofit groups that hold a congressional charter, and the president serves as its honorary chairman, in addition to appointing the chairman of its board.

President Obama and Michelle Obama, who made her pitch for the organization on YouTube and in a TV public-service announcement, visited Red Cross headquarters in Washington on Monday.

But perhaps the most valuable support the administration offered was in getting Red Cross' "Text To Help" program off to a speedy start. It was the State Department that initiated the text-messaging program shortly after the earthquake hit, said Tony Aiello, the chief executive of mGive.com, which processes the contributions. A donation process that normally takes two weeks to set up was streamlined.