[Ed. Note: Please email any news of further music-related relief efforts to [email protected].]
Bobby Moon & Lil Flip - Swagger from
AK Kurji on
Vimeo.
If you're looking for a way to contribute to the Haitian relief efforts, Houston-based international pop artist Bobby Moon is going to make it real easy for you to do so.
Go to iTunes and buy Moon's new single "Swagger," featuring Lil Flip, and 100 percent of the sales proceeds will go to an organization that's been working in Haiti way before this week's deadly earthquake.
The Pan American Development Foundation is an independent, nonprofit 501(c)(3) that helps the least advantaged people in Latin America and the Caribbean. Last year, the organization established
"I Too Am Haiti," a campaign to help the 200,000 Haitian children who are the victims of human trafficking, violence and forced labor. Now the PADF's goal is to keep those children and their families alive through the aftermath of the worst earthquake to strike the Caribbean island nation in over 200 years.
"We've been in Haiti for 30 years," says Michael Zamba, PADF senior communications director. "We are just not parachuting in. "We aren't hitting the ground running. We are on the ground." So much so that Zamba tells Rocks Off that he's not sure if his own staff, who were already bringing Haiti aid before the earthquake, are alive and safe.
Akil A.K. Kurji, director of the "Swagger" video and head of On The Mark Records, which manages Moon, called Rocks Off this morning asking which organization should benefit. It was an easy answer.
PADF has a disaster expert team in Port-au-Prince and is sending additional experts from the Dominican Republic to assist in the relief efforts. PADF is also coordinating with other Inter-American organizations to ensure a better response. PADF is shipping urgently needed supplies to Haiti like shelter kits, food, telecommunications equipment and medical supplies.
If you need more reasons to donate, here they are:
- As many as 100,000 people may have died in the massive 7.0 earthquake.
- It is estimated that an additional 3 million people are affected.
- Aftershocks continued to rock the country after the major quake.
- The AP reports that tens of thousands of Haitians may have lost their homes.
- A major hospital may have been destroyed, the Miami Herald reports.
If you want to give more than the cost of "Swagger," you can donate
here or call 877-572-4484. Visit
www.padf.org.
Rolando Rodriguez is the managing editor of
www.redbrownandblue.com. Follow him
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