In the aftermath of a Virginia Tech student's murderous rampage on Monday that left 33 dead, including the shooter, nonprofit groups have rushed to create new funds and engage in other efforts to help victims and their families, sustain the individuals and organizations assisting them, and ensure campus security throughout the state.
Virginia Tech set up the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund earlier this week to cover the costs of grief counseling, memorials, goods and services used to comfort the families of the victims and the survivors, and other incidental needs. University officials said they are still trying to calculate an initial tally of how much has been donated through the fund's Web site, which went online on Tuesday.
Additional charitable funds are being initiated by individuals with ties to Virginia Tech. For example, on Tuesday the United Way of Montgomery, Radford & Floyd, in Christiansburg, announced a fund to assist victims of the tragedy with funeral expenses, mental-health services, and other needs. Its "United in Caring Fund" was created with a $10,000 gift from Michael Vick, an Atlanta Falcons quarterback who played football at Virginia Tech. Mr. Vick has challenged other donors to match his contribution.
Community-Fund Gifts
Three Virginia community foundations have also created new funds. At the Community Foundation of New River Valley, also in Christiansburg, three siblings who graduated from Virginia Tech have established a 4-16-07 Fund with a $10,000 donation that has been matched dollar-for-dollar by their parents. The $20,000 fund, which has prompted one other $1,000 gift so far, is earmarked for activities that strengthen the local area through events that bring residents together to help one another.
At the Foundation for the Roanoke Valley, an anonymous donor set up a School Violence Assistance Fund to aid victims of Monday's shootings and similar events. The foundation said it will cover administrative expenses so that 100 percent of contributions to its fund, which now contains $20,000, will be used for that purpose.
And at the Community Foundation Serving Richmond and Central Virginia, officials said that they have not yet tallied the total of more than a dozen gifts made to its four-day-old VT Remembrance Fund for Student Safety, which aims to assist Virginia Tech in the short term and other Virginia campuses on longer-term projects to improve security.
Bobby Thalhimer, senior vice president of the Richmond community foundation, said that before setting up the fund, his group's chief executive called her counterpart at the Oklahoma City Community Foundation to ask for advice. That organization coordinated grant making after the 1995 bombing of a federal building in that city that killed 168 people. "She said to make the fund's purpose broad, because you do not know the needs that will unfold over time," Mr. Thalhimer said, referring to Oklahoma City's Nancy B. Anthony. "And she stressed the need to have broad and trusted community leadership beyond our own board allocate money from the fund."
Counselors and Meals
As community foundations and others set up new funds, other charities busied themselves marshaling different resources to respond to the shootings. Religious organizations, including Lutheran Disaster Response and Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, have sent teams of volunteer clergy and other counselors to help Virginia Tech students and families cope with the crisis.
The American Red Cross's Montgomery-Floyd Chapter, in Blacksburg, assisted by other local chapters of the disaster-relief organization, has teamed up with the Southern Baptist Convention to provide 250 meals every day this week to police, emergency medical personnel, and others responding to the shootings, said Jena Zehner, a national Red Cross spokeswoman.
The chapters, she said, have also placed a Red Cross volunteer nurse in each of the four hospitals to help the 15 victims who survived the shootings and their families. Other Red Cross volunteers are assisting victims' families with donated airline tickets and other services, such as funeral arrangements.
This week, such activities have taken precedence over efforts to generate donations. According to many Virginia charity officials, raising money, while important, is the last thing on their minds right now. Instead, they said they are joining other area residents to show support for those who lost loved ones.
"Nobody is focused on trying to raise a certain amount of money or even how much is needed right now," said Mr. Thalhimer of the Richmond community foundation. "The thing you have to be here to appreciate is that everyone here in our office and city is wearing maroon and orange, the colors of Virginia Tech. The dollars are not the story here, people are reaching out because of a sense of community."