Excuses, Excuses

Scoles in Carolina (1 link)

When I have been in town, I have spent a great deal of time coordinating media inquiries and responding to disasters or potential disasters. We had a large apartment fire in the Greenville area recently. The fire displaced 50 people, destroying 30 apartments. Since most disasters happen in the middle of the night, I had to respond to media calls beginning at midnight and conducted interviews beginning at 2:45 a.m. The positive is that no one was hurt and all of the victims received assistance from the Red Cross in various forms based on their disaster-caused needs. Here's an article from the local rag, the Greenville News We also recently had to eliminate a 15 year program due to high cost, lower than average donations (totaling a 30 percent reduction) in revenue, and the fact that the director of the program left the Red Cross. One employee of the program who lost her job contacted several media outlets regarding the program cut, so the CEO and I have spent the better part of the last two days mitigating the situation. Believe me, reporters have no hesitation calling after my business day is done! Here is an article that was written in the Greenville News after the story "broke." Thankfully, when I got a call from the local NBC affiliate Assignment Editor, she felt it was a non-issue. Usually, my reward for doing a good job is more work. That's certainly the case now. I have recently become a Public Affairs Instructor/Trainer for the National American Red Cross. What that means is that I could receive a request to teach Public Affairs anywhere in the nation and U.S. Territories. Now, I need to find organizations that grant funds to non-profits to be used for the purchase of electronic equipment for training. It is better for me that I have the equipment on hand to take with me instead of requesting it from our National office and not know how to use the equipment. Anyway, I will do better at posting again. Especially now that my travel schedule has settled down.