FireAid raises estimated $100 million for LA wildfire reduction : NPR

When wildfires broke out throughout Los Angeles final month, greater than 16,000 properties and buildings have been destroyed, and at the very least 29 individuals misplaced their lives. Native officers emphasised the unprecedented nature of the fires. And on condition that the catastrophe devastated the town the place so many inventive industries are based mostly, it did not take lengthy for actors, musicians and different leisure trade leaders — together with many who have been personally impacted by the wildfires — to bounce into motion.

On Jan. 30, the FireAid profit live performance occurred on the Intuit Dome and Kia Discussion board in Inglewood. Greater than 30 artists, together with Olivia Rodrigo, Rod Stewart, Dr. Dre and Joni Mitchell, took turns performing; comedians like Billy Crystal — who misplaced his dwelling within the fires — and Quinta Brunson additionally addressed the viewers. Brunson, who performs a instructor in her hit ABC sitcom Abbott Elementary, launched Glendale Excessive College instructor Aurora Barboza Flores, who shared how she’d spent a long time saving up for her Altadena dwelling, solely to have it burn down.

Aurora Barboza Flores and Quinta Brunson communicate onstage in the course of the FireAid profit live performance for California hearth reduction in Inglewood, California.

Amy Sussman/Getty Pictures for FIREAID/Getty Pictures North America

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Amy Sussman/Getty Pictures for FIREAID/Getty Pictures North America

In a press release shared with NPR, a spokesperson for the LA Clippers, which collaborated on the manufacturing of the profit live performance and offset working prices, mentioned that mixed ticket gross sales, merchandise gross sales, sponsorships and donations are anticipated to exceed $100 million for wildfire reduction. The estimate contains non-public items from the Eagles, U2 and music government Irving Azoff and his spouse Shelli. Clippers proprietor Steve Ballmer and his spouse additionally matched all pledges made in the course of the broadcast.

FireAid remains to be accepting donations on-line, so the entire sum of money raised is anticipated to continue to grow. The funds, administered by way of the Annenberg Basis, will assist with quick restoration efforts and long-term preventative measures throughout southern California.

“The FireAid Grants Advisory Committee, composed of longtime LA-region philanthropic leaders with deep relationships within the non-profit group, have been working to determine key areas of want for optimum impression,” reads the assertion. “Led by the Annenberg Basis, the committee has been listening each day to affected communities, assessing native useful resource gaps to make sure assist reaches these most in want, and researching the dealing with of different hearth disasters, reminiscent of these in Maui and Northern California. The primary section of grants [is] anticipated to be awarded by mid-February.”

The Grammys, which have been held in Los Angeles on Feb. 2, took an identical strategy. Earlier than the ceremony, the Recording Academy introduced that though many events and occasions main as much as the awards ceremony had been canceled in gentle of the wildfires, it could have been too massive a blow to the native economic system to cancel or postpone the present. As a substitute, the 2025 Grammys closely centered on honoring the town of Los Angeles by way of performances, video packages, commercials and speeches from many Angelenos who acquired main awards, together with Kendrick Lamar. The Recording Academy confirmed to NPR that they raised almost $9 million on Grammys Sunday alone, which shall be administered to the Academy’s charity MusiCares, humanitarian group Direct Reduction, the California Neighborhood Basis and the Pasadena Neighborhood Basis. A complete of $24 million was raised by way of different Grammys weekend occasions, the remainder of which can go in direction of “MusiCares’ ongoing initiatives to help music professionals in want.”

A legacy of movie star live shows – and issues

The Los Angeles wildfire reduction efforts observe within the footsteps of an extended legacy of movie star charity live shows. In 1971, George Harrison and sitar guru Ravi Shankar organized the Live performance for Bangladesh at Madison Sq. Backyard. On the time, the area in South Asia confronted a humanitarian disaster on account of pure disasters and a months-long struggle that resulted within the creation of Bangladesh in what was previously often known as East Pakistan.

“There are six million displaced Bengalis, most of them affected by malnutrition, cholera and likewise different ailments which are the results of residing underneath essentially the most dehumanizing circumstances,” former All Issues Thought of host Mike Waters reported in July of 1971.

George Harrison, left, performs with Jesse Ed Davis on the Live performance For Bangladesh at Madison Sq. Backyard in New York on Aug. 1, 1971.

Jim Wells/AP/AP

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Jim Wells/AP/AP

With Harrison’s Beatles star energy behind him, the Live performance for Bangladesh represented the primary movie star profit present of its type. The live performance featured performances from over a dozen artists, together with Harrison, Shankar, Eric Clapton and Bob Dylan. It raised round $243,000 for UNICEF — but it surely additionally bumped into its justifiable share of challenges.

“The large drawback with Bangladesh was that they hadn’t picked the charity earlier than the occasion. Subsequently, all of the charitable breaks you’d have, all of the tax breaks you’d have usually with a charitable occasion, did not apply,” music journalist Graeme Thomson advised Morning Version in 2021, on the fiftieth anniversary of the live performance. “There was an enormous sum of money that A, went lacking and B, went to the taxman.”

In 1985, the Los Angeles Instances reported that just about $10 million raised by way of the live performance, its subsequent dwell album of the identical identify and a documentary have been held up by the IRS for greater than a decade. Regardless of bureaucratic delays, the Live performance for Bangladesh continues to have an effect in the present day by way of the George Harrison Fund for UNICEF, which helps packages in Bangladesh and has additionally supplied assist in Angola, Romania, India, Haiti and Brazil.

On a extra philosophical stage, the Live performance for Bangladesh additionally sparked a bigger motion of Western artists shining a highlight on humanitarian crises world wide. Harrison and Shankar’s live performance served as a mannequin for 1985’s Reside Help, which featured performances by Queen, Paul McCartney and Madonna and raised greater than $100 million for famine reduction in Ethiopia. A remark made by Bob Dylan throughout that occasion sparked the creation of Farm Help, an annual profit live performance for American farmers.