"Walmart and the Walmart Foundation Announce up to $20 Million Toward Hurricane Harvey Relief and Recovery." Walmart Foundation Press Release 08/30/2017.
Wal-Mart is leading the corporate drive to assist in relief efforts, with $17 million in cash donations to aid emergency relief efforts including $15 million to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund, $1 million to the Salvation Army and $1 million to the American Red Cross.
Since 2016, Walmart, Sam's Club and the Walmart Foundation have provided more than $132 million for disaster preparedness, response and relief efforts supporting communities around the globe. Additionally, during the same time period, we have raised $44 million in donations from customers to support hurricane relief.
In total, WalMart sent 2,498 trailer loads of supplies and donated $3.5 million in goods to shelters and command centers. This is the power of Walmart's Hurricane Katrina response.
Other organizations that have raised large sums for Katrina relief include the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund, the fund established by former presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, which has collected $100 million to date, and the Salvation Army, which has raised $85.7 million.
“When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, Walmart was on the front lines of the response. Walmart opened make-shift stores, sent truckloads of supplies to our city, and activated associates on the ground to help those in need.
Philanthropy: In 2015, we committed to helping provide 4 billion meals by 2020. To date, Walmart has donated 1.2 billion pounds of food from our Walmart facilities, and Walmart and the Walmart Foundation have donated $122 million in grants to strengthen the charitable meal system.
Wal-Mart (WMT 0.30%) has no obligation to contribute to charitable causes or to give a single dime, any in-kind donations, or a even a minute of employee time to those in need. However, the world's biggest retailer does do those things.
Schools and school-based organizations that don't have formal tax-exempt status can apply for grants ranging from $500 to $2,500 through Walmart's locally-focused community grant program.
3 million residents registered for Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) assistance. 1,833 lives were lost. $120 billion in federal funds, including $75 billion in emergency relief, was spent on the recovery effort.
Within four days of Katrina's landfall on Monday, Aug. 29, 2005, then-President George W. Bush signed a $10.4 billion aid package and ordered 7,200 National Guard troops to the region. A few days later, he requested — and Congress approved — an additional $51.8 billion in aid.
Many residents did not have the ability to leave the city, so the Superdome was opened as a site for residents to weather the storm (USC Annenberg 2005). The hurricane hit on August 29th. As a direct response, FEMA mobilized 1,000 Homeland Security workers to provide assistance to the city (USC Annenberg 2005).
Five days after Hurricane Katrina made landfall, the Red Cross served nearly one million meals in a single day. More than 68 million meals were served during the response. More than 244,000 disaster workers, 95 percent of them volunteers, responded to help the hurricane survivors.
In all, Hurricane Katrina killed nearly 2,000 people and affected some 90,000 square miles of the United States.