A tremendous outpouring of support throughout the electrical industry continues to flow into the Gulf Coast. Electrical Marketing will continue to publish information on these relief efforts. To submit information on your company’s donation program, foundation or relief efforts, please contact Dale Funk, Chief Editor, Electrical Marketing at (913) 967-1800 or by e-mail at [email protected].
Along with asking its 103,000 employees in 100 countries to contribute to the company’s relief efforts, all of ABB’s power equipment manufacturing facilities are working around the clock, seven days a week to supply the utilities impacted by the storm with transformers and other electrical equipment needed to restore electricity to New Orleans and the other communities that lost power as a result of the storm.
The ABB North America Hurricane Katrina Task Force has established a special toll-free phone number exclusively for customers dealing with the storm’s aftermath. ABB customers should call 1-877-511-4222.
Acuity Brands, Atlanta, and its employees have established programs to provide over $250,000 of assistance to victims of Hurricane Katrina. Acuity Brands Lighting, the use of an idle 160,000-square-foot facility in the metropolitan Atlanta area to serve as a relief services “mega-center” for dozens of organizations providing relief to victims of Hurricane Katrina, including the United Way, American Red Cross, Goodwill Industries, Traveler’s Aid, and various other federal, state, and DeKalb County agencies and departments. The facility is helping people to register children in local schools, locate long-term housing, forward mail, receive food, clothing, and financial assistance, and find other needed relief services under one roof. During its first week of operation, the facility helped almost 5,000 families including placing 2,250 families in long-term housing.
Acuity Brands Lighting quickly responded to FEMA’s request for emergency lighting for a temporary housing site near New Orleans and shipped and installed 200 Lithonia Dusk-to-Dawn lighting fixtures.
At its annual meeting in Dallas earlier this month, distributor and supplier members of Affiliated Distributors, King of Prussia, Pa., donated more than $38,000 in gift cards and checks for families that were living in Texas shelters and needed to rebuild their lives.
CLS, Hartford, is offering employees fully paid, two-week leave of absence to all eligible employees (those who meet Red Cross screening requirements) who volunteer to complete the necessary training become a Red Cross Disaster Services Human Resources (DSHR) volunteer and serve a two-week assignment in the disaster area. To date, 15 CLS employees have applied for the DSHR effort. The Red Cross expects to be involved in disaster relief in the area for many months. In addition, CLS is collecting employee donations to the American Red Cross’ Hurricane Katrina Disaster Relief fund and will match all employee donations on a dollar-for-dollar basis.
CED, Westlake Village, Calif., has established a fund specifically to assist employees in need. Contributions may be sent to: CED, Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund, 31356 Via Colinas #107, Westlake Village, CA. 91362-6799.
Cooper Power Systems, Waukesha, Wis., increased production of all transformers to meet anticipated high demand associated with the Hurricane Katrina rebuild in the Gulf region.
Crescent Electric Supply Co., East Dubuque, Ill., is matching up to the first $100,000 donated to the American Red Cross - Hurricane Relief through Crescent Electric Supply Co. Checks can be made out too the “American Red Cross - Hurricane Relief” and sent to: John Miller, c/o Crescent Electric Supply Co., PO Box 500, East Dubuque, Ill. 61025-4420.
Eaton Electrical, Pittsburgh, has mobilized a dedicated team to support regional customers and partners affected by Hurricane Katrina. The Katrina Response Team located in Eaton’s customer care center has a team of employees that includes application engineers, project engineers, take-off and quotation engineers and project coordinators. They will handle technical and application questions, provide design/build assistance and focus on order entry, expediting, order status, shipping, logistics and emergency after-hour support. The team can also be reached via e-mail at [email protected].
In response to Hurricane Katrina, Federal Pacific, Bristol Va., shipped five truckloads of switchgear and transformers to the Gulf Coast region in five days.
FCI-Burndy, Manchester, N.H., matched employee donations to the American Red Cross, up to an additional contribution by the company of $10,000.
Teams from GE’s Lighting, GE Electrical Distribution, and GE Motors operations have been working together to establish 24/7 customer support and emergency response teams, coordinate customer communication, extend payment terms for distributors in FEMA-declared disaster areas, release damaged equipment safety warnings and help distributors bring in inventory to support relief efforts. In addition, at GE Consumer & Industrial’s appliances plant in Decatur, Ala., employees are working overtime to produce 35,000 16-cubic-foot refrigerators that FEMA has ordered for its onsite trailers. Federal relief authorities have also asked GE to provide medical devices, power generation equipment, and water purification systems. GE has already donated over $6 million to the Red Cross. GE employees donated approximately $1 million, which the GE Foundation matched at 100 percent. The company also donated $10 million in equipment and services.
Royal Philips Electronics, parent of Philips Lighting, Somerset, N.J. is donating more than $1 million in cash and products to Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. An allocation of $750,000 in products from the company’s Lighting, Medical Systems, Domestic Appliances and Personal Care and Consumer Electronics divisions will be directed to the rebuilding of the healthcare infrastructure in New Orleans. In addition, Philips will match donations to the Red Cross — dollar-for-dollar — from its 18,000 U.S. employees. As of Sept. 16, U.S. employees had donated $219,238.
Rexel USA, Dallas, has established a fund to assist its employees in need. Several of the company’s branches were seriously damaged in the storms, and employees were living in some of the areas of the Gulf Coast that got hit worst. Donations can be sent to the Rexel Employee Relief Fund: Rexel Inc., Attention: Leslie Bell-Finch, 6606 LBJ Freeway, Suite 200, Dallas, Texas, 75240.
The WESCOInternational Charitable Foundation has been set up to accumulate contributions and distribute relief assistance directly to WESCO employees. Checks should be made payable to “WESCO International Charitable Foundation” and in the memo section at the bottom of your check please write, “Hurricane Relief.” Mail checks to: WESCO Distribution, Inc., 225 W. Station Square Drive, Suite 700, Pittsburgh, PA 15219-1122. For information on the WESCO International Charitable Foundation, check out http://wescodist.com