Last evening, Conference and District disaster response coordinators met after all assessments were completed to finalize the most recent plans for disaster response in Jacksonville, Little Rock, North Little Rock, Sherwood, and Wynne.
All communication regarding response updates for these service areas will be provided on the Arkansas Conference website and Facebook and the ARUMC Volunteers in Mission and Disaster Response Facebook group. Follow these platforms to stay updated on all disaster response updates.
As of today, there are three ways to support the United Methodist disaster response in Arkansas from the March 31 tornadoes:
- Give online to support the long-term United Methodist disaster response ministry in Arkansas. Please consider donating to ARUMC Volunteers in Mission/Disaster Response to keep funds local. Donations to UMCOR are always encouraged as well.
- Hands-on help is requested for the following service areas:
- Data entry
- Making phone calls
- Food delivery
- Running errands
- Delivery of supplies (lunches, buckets, donated items, etc.)
- Onsite disaster response
- Begin collecting items for Wynne and Pulaski County:
- NEW (in packages) socks – all sizes
- NEW (in packages) underwear – all sizes
- NEW (in packages) t-shirts – all sizes
- NEW containers of shampoo
- NEW tubes of toothpaste
- Begin collecting items for Wynne Distribution Site (187 Murray Street, Wynne) ONLY:
- Pop-up tents
- Air mattresses – all sizes
- Spray sunscreen
- Readers glasses
- Plastic storage tubs
- Battery packs
- Chargers
- First Aid kits
- Non-perishable food
- Blankets
- Pillows
- Styrofoam coolers
- Power cords
- Bungee cords
- Baby food
The Wynne command center will be at First UMC Wynne and should be operational very soon. The city distribution site is located at 187 Murray Street in Wynne and is accepting donations (listed above).
The Central District command center will be located at St. James UMC in Little Rock, ENTRANCE #6 ONLY. This will be a temporary drop-off site and Pulaski County donations CAN ONLY BE ACCEPTED BETWEEN NOON – 4 PM ON WEDNESDAY, April 5.
More permanent distribution sites are being coordinated and will be announced tomorrow.
If you have any people who would like to serve on the ground with disaster response, including tarping, clean-up, loading, unloading, etc., and they are NOT ERT-certified, please contact disaster@arumc.org. Teams are being assembled with an ERT-certified leader that can accompany you or your group.
If you want to volunteer to serve at a command center, please contact disaster@arumc.org.