August 3, 2007 | Read Time: 1 minute
Trista Harris, who works for the Minnesota Community Foundation, is wondering what philanthropy’s role should be following disasters such as the bridge collapse in Minneapolis.
“Do we pull together memorial funds to honor the lives of those lost, do we support the Red Cross that has to do the heavy lifting with these types of events but is facing severe funding shortages as large funders like the United Way change focus, or do we pull agencies together to figure out how to prepare as best we can before tragedy strikes?” she asks on her blog, New Voices of Philanthropy. “I don’t know which answer is right but I don’t feel like I have the privilege of standing idly by.”
Ms. Harris writes that the disaster is a very personal one to her. She lives two miles from the I-35 expanse and if her plans hadn’t changed that evening, she could have been driving across the bridge with her two children at the time of its collapse.
What do you think? What should philanthropy’s role be after the Minneapolis disaster? Click on the comments link below this post to share your thoughts.
