HAWAII - As wildfires devastate Maui, a former Riverbend resident is asking people to donate toys and school supplies for kids who have lost everything.
Brad Beck lives with his wife in Hawaii but grew up in the Riverbend, and he has seen the destruction firsthand. When Beck dropped off supplies at the War Memorial Stadium in Kahului, which is operating as a recovery center for about 1,000 people right now, he couldn’t look away from the young kids who lost their homes overnight.
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“A $10 toy could change the world for these kids right now,” Beck said. “These kids have lost everything. I mean, absolutely, because people ran. No one had time to really grab anything. So what we wanted to do was a toy drive so that these kids could at least have something to hold on to that is theirs, that could maybe bring some kind of relief in all this madness.”
Beck is asking anyone who is able to donate toys, backpacks and school supplies for Maui children. Because shipping to Hawaii is expensive, he suggests people make their purchases through Amazon Prime and have them shipped to Beck’s workplace address:
Maui Community Correctional Center
ATTN: Brad Beck
600 Waiale Road
Wailuku, HI 96793
If you want to help with rescue efforts or necessities, Beck and other Hawaii residents encourage you to donate to the Maui Strong Fund through the Hawaii Community Foundation. This organization does not collect any fees, so your full donation will go directly to someone who needs it.
“[My wife] and I spent most of our lives in the Riverbend, and having dealt with the floods and things like that, I just know the residents know what we’re going through,” Beck added. “We just want to get as many toys and backpacks and school supplies and stuff like that in here that we can for these kids.”
As of writing, there have been 96 confirmed deaths with over 1,000 people still missing. The death toll is expected to rise in the coming days.
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