Benefit concert, donations help Red Cross help Japan

Whitman County Red Cross chapter is encouraging residents and businesses to launch their own fund-raiser for the relief efforts in Japan.

So far, roughly $1,500 has been donated at the Red Cross office in Pullman.

Two grass-root fund-raisers in Whitman County have successfully been completed since a massive earthquake and tsunami struck off the northeast coast of Japan March 11. The most recent was a benefit concert at the Belltower in Pullman last week, which featured four college-age bands or soloists.

The April 7 concert which drew crowds mostly from Moscow and Pullman, ran for three hours, during which time band fans came in and out of the dimly lit, historic building to support their favorite band.

Some of the performers gave a plug to the audience on donating more to the concert beyond their ticket price; tickets were $10 in advance and $15 at the door. The concert raised $317, less than the anticipated $1,500 to $2,000 it was expected to raise, said Shanne Miller, director of the Red Cross office in Pullman.

The other fundraiser was a coin drive by the students of Palouse High School. Elementary and high school students plucked coins from their piggy banks, couches and parents’ pockets to raise $501 for Japan.

“Fundraisers can be a wide variety of things…It just depends on who has the passion for it,” said Miller. Selling T-shirts, an auction, bake sale or a percentage of business proceeds for the day could be ways to raise funds.

Only financial donations will be taken at this time. Miller said the most urgent supplies needed on the island now are clean water, food and sturdy shelters. The destruction caused by the tsunami displaced almost 175,000 people, all now in need of shelter.

“Right now, we don’t have a lot of third parties coming to us to help with a fundraiser,” she said.

While her office can’t initiate a fundraiser, it can come alongside the efforts of any group who begins and directs one.

The Pullman Kiwanis Club donated $200 to the office.

Colfax Rotary Club has committed $1,000 to a Rotary International Foundation project to provide temporary shelters. The club is also collecting donations for the project.