Between March 2020 and September 2021, Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes, Ample PPE’s charitable project, has handed out over 21 million PPE and cleaning product items to those in need. But even with millions of dollars of in-kind donations, we still rely on and need individual contributions. Your help in one particular area is crucial, as I explain below.
Demand for PPE Remains High
Hospital workers, first responders, and vulnerable communities in NYC continue to contact me on a daily basis about their equipment shortages. Their predicament is due in part to the continuing mandates or personal risk such as being elderly or immune compromised. Thankfully, corporations like Walmart, Home Depot, pharmacy distributors and other PPE vendors and donors like All Good brand, have learned about our work and are shipping essential equipment to us, at no cost. We receive in-kind donations of many multiple millions of PPE and cleaning products every month.
We are still fundraising to pay the PPE debt. Help with a donation to our GoFundMe.
Our Community/Emergency Warehouse Success –a proof of concept
Instead of solely distributing from tables at hospitals and at public housing sites, in June and July we acquired a 50,000-square-foot warehouse, a former Shoprite in Staten Island. This massive donated space allowed us to distribute, at near zero cost, over 5.8 million items of free PPE and cleaning products to hospital workers, first responders, and vulnerable communities over the five NYC boroughs. You can see Facebook photos of our “proof of concept” hybrid community/first responder+warehouse https://www.facebook.com/page/104087861270923/search/?q=July%202021
Over 500 pallets of goods were picked up by over 100 government agencies, hospitals, and community groups. Often making multiple trips, these organizations brought vehicles large and small to the warehouse during the summer months. Everyone was so happy to have access to free quality products to keep themselves and communities safe. In gratitude, they write that they are thankful to have stocked up at the Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes warehouse during the summer months as the pandemic continues into the Fall.
We Need to Distribute PPE to Smaller Organizations
Here is the bottom line: We continue to get daily requests for PPE to Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes from smaller organizations, including those in the poorest communities of Harlem and the South Bronx. Thankfully, we are able to meet their needs with truckloads of millions of items that keep coming in from generous corporations and from New York State.
With your help, we are bringing free PPE to hospital workers, homeless people, public housing residents, the food insecure and others at risk.
APRIL 23, 2022 UPDATE: Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes has now handed out more than 21 million items of PPE to estimated 2.5 million healthcare workers, veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and public housing residents since April 2020. This includes our 150 + events for hospital workers, public housing residents and food insecurity programs.
Update/ September 2020 : Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes handed out in Miami and Hialeah more than 2 million items of PPE to more than 60,000 healthcare workers and organizations serving vulnerable communities.
Read founder Rhonda Roland Shearer’s Medium article, “Why I took out a $1 million loan against my home to buy PPE.”
People magazine featured Rhonda’s story on Sept. 11, her work after the 2001 terrorist attacks, and how that has shaped her work now.
Come to the rescue of our heroes! The more money we raise, the more supplies we can provide. We need caring people to step up so we can continue going to hospitals, help healthcare workers in need, and others in need!
| CONTACT: General inquiries: info@asrlab.org Media inquiries, e-mail info@asrlab.org Donate through GoFundMe at https://www.gofundme.com/f/cut-red-tape-4-heroes For Volunteering, sign up here: bit.ly/CutRedTapeVols If you would like more information about donating, privately donating, or corporate donations, please contact info@asrlab.org and/or +1 (212) 925-8812. |
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Just like Art Science Research Laboratory’s 9/11 supply operations, we are cutting through red tape for supplying PPEs during an emergency. Waste and endlessly disappearing donated PPE supplies happened then, and is happening now. Back in the first days of Ground Zero operations, ASRL first operated out of the back of a truck to deliver respirators and other PPEs directly into first responders’ hands, as widely documented in foundation and news reports.
The COVID-19 emergency has a similar failure in distribution–while the government and media continue to report millions of PPEs being purchased and shipped into NYC, it is frustrating and dangerous that health care staff still do not have sufficient PPEs. Our solution is CutRedTape4Heroes.org— a program where we park a truck packed with KN95 masks, surgical masks, Face Shields, Gowns in front of hospitals and nursing homes in need, and have volunteers securely pass out PPEs to health care workers who stand in line 6 feet apart. Heath Care Workers show a valid hospital ID (which we photograph with a phone camera like when you enter buildings) to obtain needed PPEs.
Beneficiaries of Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes COVID-19 Efforts in NYC include:
1. Hospital workers at 26 NYC-area hospitals.
2. FDNY EMS, First Responders, Fire Inspectors
3. Housing Works’ Covid-19 Homeless Shelters’ Staff
4. Health care workers at nursing homes and homeless shelters
5. Home care workers
6. Veterans and community members including residents at 10 public housing complexes in hot spot zip codes
“We know from our experience after 9/11 that there is no time to wait to fundraise first in a crisis. We need to move quickly to buy, then deliver the equipment where it is most needed to assure we are saving as many lives as we can,” said Rhonda Roland Shearer, co-founder of ASRL, who is using her home equity loan to launch the project. “If that means standing on street corners, handing out masks to nurses, we will do that.”
To learn more and contribute to Cut Red Tape 4 Heroes, visit at cutredtape4heroes.org or follow along for updates on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Media inquiries, e-mail both info@asrlab.org
Donate through GoFundMe at https://www.gofundme.com/f/cut-red-tape-4-heroes
For Volunteering, sign up here: bit.ly/CutRedTapeVols
If you would like more information about donating, privately donating, or corporate donations, please contact info@asrlab.org and/or 212.925.8812.
Art Science Research Laboratory , a 501c3, not-for-profit, was the main provider of desperately needed respirators and personal protective equipment for uniform services (police and fire) during the 9 months of recovery operations at World Trade Center Ground Zero after Sept. 11. Learn more about our Ground Zero work in this New York Times article or on our website for WTC Ground Zero.
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