Bypass Bureaucracy for Mountain Areas Affected by Helene

This past week, I've seen some of the best in humanity - neighbors doing anything to help each other, continuous lines of vehicles waiting to be loaded up to deliver supplies to remote mountain communities, and donations pouring in from everywhere. I know that eventually, it will run out if some outages are as long as predicted, but right now there are so many pallets of water that some places are struggling to store it all.

Responses from aid groups & government organizations have been massive & swift. I'm shocked that our washed-out neighborhood road has already been rebuilt to a drivable, single lane of crushed gravel. But honestly, our neighborhood didn't need the most help and many on the outskirts aren't getting the help that they need. What started as grassroots chaos has started to consolidate into a few hubs of power & bureaucracy.

One group was going to give me a couple of small generators to take to cut-off elderly people in a hard-hit area, but someone else had already taken them. So I was told there would be more that afternoon, then the next day, then cables had to arrive, then there was a new official process I would have to go through. There are nearly a thousand generators sitting in the parking lot and at this point, by the time many of them go out, the need will be gone (for better or for worse). The generators are also massively oversized, will be difficult to deliver, & require more fuel than necessary. After doing everything the group wanted me to do for multiple days, I was essentially asked to leave because I kept asking for updates on the generators. Yeah, it was pretty shocking & hurt a bit, but now isn't the time to worry about that.

So I left, bought two generators myself, and took them to those people - a 97-year-old woman still living in her own house up a now massively rutted rocky road and another elderly woman who looks like Betty White's younger sister. I have never done this before, and thought that I never would because there is always a greater need, but I've set up this GoFundMe to directly & quickly deliver generators or other critical needs to the people who critically need them. I know of no way of providing proof & I'm not a non-profit with tax-deductible donations, so if you'd rather give to an official organization please do. If you would rather ensure funds are used quickly & directly, I'll do my best. Any leftover will be donated to an organization sticking around here for the long haul once this area is once again a forgotten corner of the mountains.

If anyone from a large organization reads this - yes, I fully understand the need to ensure supplies like generators don't go to the wrong people, but not at the expense of none going to the right people. Not at a time like this. As a Christian myself, I'd like to point the Christian organizations carefully guarding their supplies to Luke 6:29-30: “If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.” And for those insisting people know where the help came from - "when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing" Matthew 6:3

Power outages in Watauga & Avery counties are down to about 10K people. Many of those will be extended for weeks, but if you filter out vacation homes or others currently unoccupied, the cost of one of the politician's trips & "aerial tours" of the damage could have easily provided a reasonable-sized generator for each of those homes that needed it.