Final Report

Hurricane Harvey Recovery Funder Briefings

January 29-June 4, 2018

Background

For over four months, the Center for Disaster Philanthropy with support from The Simmons Foundation, sponsored bi-weekly funder briefings through webinars on the Zoom platform. The briefings were designed to:

  • Provide regular updates on the recovery with special attention to community needs and subject matter experts to inform donors; and,
  • Allow funders to report on their own organizational initiatives with opportunities to receive and ask questions of other funders present for the briefings.

Over the course of the ten briefings, featured guests covered the following topics:

  1. Disaster damage assessments;
  2. Work of National VOAD and Texas VOAD;
  3. Work of a philanthropic member associations in the region, Philanthropy Southwest;
  4. Episcopal Health Foundation research on the recovery of vulnerable populations;
  5. Hazard mitigation principles and the role of Texas A&M in the recovery;
  6. Environmental impacts and grantmaking;
  7. Affordable housing recovery and monitoring;
  8. Mental and behavioral health programs;
  9. Disaster Case Management; and,
  10. Flow of private, state and federal funds to Harvey recovery.

Invitations for each briefing were sent to the following organizations for publication through their listservs:

  1. Center for Disaster Philanthropy (included prior attendees)
  2. Philanthropy Southwest
  3. Foundation Center Donor List for Hurricane Harvey
  4. Council of Foundations
  5. United Philanthropy Forum

In addition, the briefings were advertised on CDP’s website and through its social media posts.

Fifty to sixty attendees joined most briefings, with the briefing on the research done by Dr. Shao-Chee Sim being the most attended (68), and the briefing on March 26 with Philanthropy Southwest having the smallest registration (24). Most national registrants (non-Texas based) attended the majority of the briefings, often with more than one representative, demonstrating sustained interest over the span of briefings, and the majority of attendees were present for the full time allotted to each briefing. A list of the organizations that appeared in registration emails is attached to this report. Individuals from these organizations and individuals who registered under personal emails are not reported.

The primary audience in terms of repeat registrations, number of participants and length of viewing appears to be corporate funders, e.g., Walmart, Petco, All State, Target.

Reflection

The archive of recordings, reports and slides (when applicable) that now resides on The Simmons Foundation website is a resource for future disasters and for funders who may still be investing in long-term recovery. As Foundation Center tracks donations to Harvey recovery, we hope to find attendees at the briefings among those listed.

We believe that national attention to a disaster, once faded, is hard to reclaim, and the delay between the disaster event and the launch of the briefings may have diminished the reach and composition of the audience. However, our target audience was national funders, and those are clearly represented among the attendees.

We were disappointed in the lack of give-and-take among the funders and attempted to prompt this through “planting” funder reports from among attendees. With each of these, CDP had a preliminary preparatory phone call, during which organizations agreed to and rehearsed a series of comments about their funding or questions about collaborative work. In the actual moment of the briefing, several did not raise their hands to speak. In checking back with the first several that did not “jump in,” they did not have an explanation, and we did not attempt additional follow-ups. To prevent dead space in the middle of each briefing, we moved that section to the end of the broadcast in hopes of keeping the audience online.

It may be that the national funders were not as familiar with each other as those that may be on the ground in the affected area and were therefore unlikely to enter into a conversation. It is our intention over the next several weeks to be in touch with a select few with whom CDP has an ongoing relationship to inquire about their experiences, and if new insight is gained, we will report that back to The Simmons Foundation. We have had success with participation in these briefings during past major disasters (Alabama tornadoes, Superstorm Sandy), both of which began very soon after the initial relief period.

Summary

We received several emails thanking us for the briefings, one of which suggested that the organization had sourced several grants based on the calls. Another said that they learned much about disaster funding, an area in which they had little past experience. For our part, we appreciated our partnership with The Simmons Foundation, and look forward to staying in communication during the 2018 Atlantic Hurricane Season.