Oprah Winfrey and Dwayne Johnson have committed $10 million to make direct payments to people on Maui who are unable to return to their homes because of the wildfires, through a...
Oprah Winfrey and Dwayne Johnson have committed $10 million to make direct payments to people on Maui who are unable to return to their homes because of the wildfires, through a new fund they announced Thursday.
They are looking forward to the help of “every person who called me and said, ‘What can I do?’” Winfrey said in the video. “This is what you can do.” “Dolly’s idea was that, ‘Hey, look, these are my people and I want to take care of them and we trust them to know what recovery looks like for themselves and their families in the days and weeks following this immediate catastrophe here,’” Conyers said.
Winfrey, who lives on Maui part-time, visited an emergency shelter on Maui in the days after the wildfire hit and worried about effectively getting resources to residents. At least 115 people were killed in the fires, though an unknown number are still missing. The fire that ripped through the historic town of Lahaina on Aug. 8 was the deadliest in the U.S. in more than a century.
The Entertainment Industry Fund, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit that helps celebrities administer their charitable work, is sponsoring the fund, the announcement said.