Red Cross Steps Up To Help Sandy Evacuees With Last Minute Hotel Funds
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- The Red Cross has stepped in to help hundreds of Superstorm Sandy evacuees thrown into housing limbo after New York City stopped paying to put them up in hotels.
Nearly 300 people displaced by the October storm were still staying in 27 hotels at city expense this week, but their last night on the city's dime came Thursday. As of Friday they were to be on their own.
But the Red Cross said Friday that it had committed up to $1 million to extend the hotels of many of those families.
It wasn't immediately clear, though, whether all would get help in time to avoid eviction.
Red Cross Steps Up To Help Sandy Evacuees With Last Minute Hotel Funds
Legal aid attorney Judith Goldiner told 1010 WINS reporter Mona Rivera that the last-minute funding was a miracle. Goldiner spent the day on Friday calling families to let them know that they could continue to stay in hotels.
"I think it's a miracle. That's all I can say," she said.
A social service organization called New York Disaster Interfaith Services was hurriedly working to identify people who had been clients of the city program.
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