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Widespread showers and thunderstorms are expected this afternoon and evening under a Flood Watch starting at 2 p.m.
Victoria Sanchez
TOPICS:
WASHINGTON (7News) — The wars in Ukraine and Gaza are displacing more than 5.5 million people, according to the UN Refugee Agency. Those numbers are just a fraction of the 123 million people forced to flee in all current global conflicts.
The Trump administration's dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is putting pressure on non-profits and humanitarian organizations to fill the gaps in foreign aid that the United States used to provide.
Dissolving the agency began on President Donald Trump's second inauguration day. As of March, 83 percent of programs at USAID were canceled. That equates to 5,200 contracts, according to KFF.
In a May 20 written statement to the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations, the Inspector General for the U.S. Agency for International Development documented concerns as remaining USAID projects were being absorbed by the State Department and called the move, " … a historic realignment and reorganization of its foreign assistance architecture and programs." While USAID no longer exists, the USAID Office of Inspector General continues to oversee taxpayer-funded foreign assistance.
Global humanitarian relief organization ShelterBox USA does not get government funding, but works with non-profits that did get financial help from USAID.
"Right now, what we've seen in the already underfunded areas, a lot of organizations had to pull out programs, cut programs, reduce staff," said Kerri Murray, president of ShelterBox USA.
Resources for the groups left standing are being stretched thin.
"There has been a pull back, right, we know this and we don't know if and when that is going to change. So for right now, we know, we've been asked and called upon to do more," she told 7News Anchor Victoria Sanchez. "We have to get out there and raise visibility of this vexing issue that's facing our entire planet. That's what we stay focused on here at ShelterBox."
Raising visibility hopefully will equate to donations. With the military conflicts far from American's front doors, Murray said it's important to highlight our similarities.
“Things that we hold most dear – family, faith, community – it’s not different. We all care about the same things. So, if I can connect people a little bit closer to the people around the world, people they may never meet but whose lives they can absolutely transform or save, I have to do that," she said.
Ukraine and Gaza are dominating headlines but Murray said there is the "forgotten crisis". ShelterBox is in Somalia, Chad and Cameroon — hotspots around the world no one is talking about but where families are displaced.
To learn more about ShelterBox USA and the humanitarian shelters they send all over the world, click here.
