Helene Disaster Relief
Helene Disaster Relief and Beyond:
The People’s Warehouse
(Update January 2025)
RUMAH’s mutual aid warehouse, affectionately called “ The People’s Warehouse”, began as disaster relief effort and continues as such for Western North Carolina and our surrounding region.
Over the past three and a half months, we hustled enormous amounts of aid of various kinds to WNC. And when WNC fluctuated with abundance in supplies, we provided supplies to local mutual aid projects in our area. Our goal is to preposition ourselves to be able to respond to a variety of disasters locally and regionally. Besides obvious climate related disasters such as hurricanes, fires, and floods; we also recognize our country’s harmful systemic and economic flaws as ongoing disasters. We feel our local community warrants aid too. It is important to us to support our community as well as the people out west.
To provide material assistance for disaster relief, The People’s Warehouse crew manages weekly:
Shipment deliveries
Cleaning/upkeep of warehouse and potential outdoor pantry
Sorting donations
Supply drives
Outreach and relationship building
Active deliveries of aid to hubs in WNC
Strategizing and pursuing resources nationally & locally
Join our crew! Community work makes the dream work! Check out the budding Pantries project, as we will be working closely/overlapping programs with them!
22nd, APRIL 2025
QUICK UPDATE: The warehouse scheduled to be emptied in April and is now closed. If you are interested in our disaster relief efforts and being involved in the future please email us at contact.rumah@gmail.com! Closing of the warehouse story will be shared sometime soon!
Networks of Collaboration
RUMAH major collaborators within the warehouse are Distribute Aid (DA), Mutual Aid Disaster Relief (MADR) and Democracy Green (DG). Democracy Green is a disaster relief AND environmental justice group, lead by black indigenous women native to NC (the Rutherfordton area of WNC). They have an organizational office located in Holly Springs NC. We utilize and share storage space with DG and DA at the warehouse. DG leases the building and gives RUMAH the autonomy to arrange and manage the space for us all. DG often asks us for assistance with sorting their donations and accepting shipments as well.
Distribute Aid, is a larger international organization that helps us get items in bulk shipped to the warehouse for free or for shipping cost coverage. They have built a network of warehouses in the Gulf Coast and south eastern region of the country so they can assist with disaster relief within the states. They also currently have a functioning network in Europe into the middle east. They've sent and currently still send, aid to Gaza, Ukraine and other disaster stricken areas. DA acts as a middle man between larger corporate places and grassroots organizations like us, to help get us lot of free stuff at little to no cost. Having worked with DA since the beginning of RUMAH’s creation, we have helped connect people to DA as well as DA connect other mutual aid grassroots groups to us. Thanks to DA, we are part of a larger, regional warehouse mutual aid effort to protect our communities and share resources with one another when disaster strikes.
Mutual Aid Disaster Relief, is a nation wide grassroots disaster relief network, that connect mutual aid groups to resources, medics, and on the ground scouts for assistance with disaster relief. RUMAH is able to connect with other organizations like us and stay informed on best practices of assistance, how we can assist each other from afar, and share larger informational resources with each other. We directly collaborate with the WNC MADR wing and the national MADR as well.
Through DA and MADR organizations we are able to build solidarity regionally and across the nation.
Locally we collaborate with Triangle Mutual Aid, Raleigh Food Not Bombs, and NC Harm Reduction. Where we’ve worked on logistics for supplies, transporting, and volunteer opportunities. In addition, we provide space for back-stock for NC Harm Reduction. Places we have re-donated items too are Clothes Not Bombs (part of FNB), Healing Transitions, and with local community members who are caring for local homeless encampments. We will be working closely with the pantries team in the upcoming month to provide a free community pantry and fridge outside of the warehouse. Check out RUMAH Projects page to learn more.
