A guide to collaborative wildfire recovery, informed from community organizations who have lived through it.
Over the years, the GlobalGiving community has stood alongside people recovering from fires in communities around the world—from Maui and California to Australia, South Korea, Nigeria, and beyond. While every fire is different, we’ve noticed a pattern:
Lasting recovery goes deeper than clearing debris.
From small acts of healing, like retaking cherished family photos lost in the fire, to community-wide efforts to build a safer electrical system, the examples in this guide offer ideas inspired by people who have experienced wildfire.
The organizations featured throughout this guide are all members of the GlobalGiving community. They are trusted local partners who have led recovery efforts in the places they call home and whose experiences continue to shape how we think about wildfire recovery around the world.
If you live in—or care about—a community affected by wildfire, we hope these examples inspire ideas for healing, rebuilding, and preparing for what’s next.
Depending on your circumstances, you may be navigating insurance claims, government assistance, temporary housing, legal questions, healthcare, or mental health support—all while trying to process what has happened.
Trusted organizations can help you understand what resources are available and how to access them. Local nonprofits and community groups can help people navigate complicated systems, connect with services, and find support that may otherwise be difficult to reach.
For example, after the Maui wildfires, Upcountry Strong coordinated daily cleanup projects, Hawai’i People’s Fund purchased generators, coolers, and tents for temporary shelter, and Hui No Ke Ola Pono provided Indigenous health care along with food access and distribution.
If you were affected, ask local organizations in your neighborhood for help. If you want to offer help, consider volunteering your time. If you live farther away, you could support their work financially or help amplify their efforts.
After a wildfire, getting help isn’t always as simple as knowing where to apply. Immigrants and other marginalized communities may face additional barriers to accessing emergency assistance, housing, healthcare, or recovery resources. Some may worry about interacting with government agencies. Others may not have access to information in their language or have the networks needed to navigate complex bureaucratic systems.
Trusted, grassroots organizations can help bridge these gaps. For example, groups like Nuestra Comunidad and Puertas Abiertas provided rent subsidies and “Go Kits” for undocumented families after the 2020 California fires.
And after the Maui fires of ‘23, Roots Reborn hosted educational preparedness events, offered trusted legal counseling, and helped residents navigate complex recovery programs in their native language. Ka Hale A Ke Ola Homeless Resource Centers (KHAKO) organized vital services for unhoused people and offered medical clinics, childcare, emergency rentals, transportation, and more.
If you’re experiencing the aftermath of a fire, community organizations can help you navigate recovery safely. And if you’re looking for ways to help, supporting these organizations can extend the reach of recovery efforts to people who might otherwise fall through the cracks.
In the aftermath of a disaster, people need more than information. They need places to ask questions, make decisions, share resources, and figure out what comes next.
That might be a community meeting, a neighborhood gathering, or even a regular online call. What matters is creating space for people to connect with one another and have a voice in what recovery looks like.
After the Maui fire, resident Sara Tekula and her neighbors began receiving calls about what would happen to the land that burned on the watershed they depend on.
“We were having lots of individual conversations, but we realized we needed to bring neighbors together to talk about what recovery could look like for all of us.”—Sara Tekula, KCWA
They started with a Zoom meeting, which allowed displaced neighbors to participate in conversation. Eventually the group organized a hike through a nearby restoration project and began imagining what collective, landscape-scale recovery might look like. From there, they became the Kula Community Watershed Alliance (KCWA), an official nonprofit organizing fire-affected landowners in land recovery efforts.
If you’re part of a community affected by wildfire, consider how you might help create or support spaces where people can gather: not just to receive information, but to shape the recovery themselves.
After a wildfire, communities may be mourning loved ones, homes, livelihoods, landscapes, and ways of life. Gathering together can help people acknowledge those losses. That might look like a memorial, a cultural ceremony, a community meal, or simply a place where people can come together to remember what and who they’ve lost.
After fires in South Korea, Peace Winds and A-PAD Korea worked in 18 villages across Gyeongsangbuk-do, delivering emergency supplies—clothing, hygiene kits, and food—to over 800 people. Eventually, they formed Spring Again to offer survivors the chance to retake cherished family portraits lost in the fire as a step toward healing.
Another example comes from Na Keiki O Emalia, who offered support groups, age-appropriate children’s books about grief, and community events with psychosocial support resources after the Maui wildfires. Hospice Maui funded workshops on trauma-informed care and self-care for counselors, social workers, teachers, hospital staff, and others who work tirelessly to support fellow wildfire survivors.
If you’re supporting a community after a disaster, remember that not every form of recovery is visible. Sometimes, one of the most meaningful things you can do is make or support space for people to grieve, remember, and care for one another.
Wildfires affect more than people. Pets can be separated from their families, livestock may need to be evacuated, and wildlife can be injured, displaced, or lose critical habitat. If you’re helping a community recover from wildfire, consider supporting local animal shelters, wildlife organizations, or veterinary groups.
During California’s 2020 fires, the Wildlife Disaster Recovery Network brought together veterinarians, wildlife biologists, ecologists, and trained volunteers to care for wildlife and livestock, while also creating a hotline for people to report injured animals. After the Maui fires, Hawaiʻi Animal Rescue Foundation housed pets and reunited missing animals with their families, while Peace Winds helped cover veterinary costs and provided pet food and dog beds.
You can help by supporting wildlife rehabilitation and conservation groups, animal shelters, veterinary organizations, or local efforts to restore damaged habitat.
After a wildfire, local businesses can be among the first places to struggle—and among the most important to a community’s financial recovery. When you can, consider supporting local businesses in fire-affected communities.
Supporting organizations that can provide direct financial assistance can also help channel resources to businesses that need them most. After tragic fires in Nigeria, the Elite Star Foundation delivered micro-grants to 500 of the hardest hit vendors. “This bypasses red tape,” their team later shared.
In another approach, Pacific Community Ventures helped small businesses obtain property assessments, navigate or file insurance claims, and connect with legal or case-management support. In Australia, the Community Foundation For Tumut Region provided bushfire-impacted families with pre-paid gift cards to local businesses.
These kinds of efforts offer a reminder that recovery isn’t only about rebuilding homes and clearing debris. It’s also about helping the places people rely on every day reopen their doors, restore livelihoods, and bring communities back together. Supporting or volunteering relevant expertise at organizations like these is another way everyday people can help after a wildfire.
After disasters, it’s natural to want to donate any food available. But communities may need culturally familiar foods, ingredients that accommodate dietary restrictions, or food that can be prepared with limited access to kitchens and electricity. They may also need food that is appropriate for children, older adults, or people with specific health needs.
Supporting local food providers or donating funds is more helpful than sending unsolicited supplies.
Maui Hub, a Native-run nonprofit, is a great example of bringing culturally appropriate food to displaced, multigenerational Hawaiian families after the Maui wildfires. Maui Hub purchases food from local farmers while giving survivors the autonomy to choose culturally relevant foods that aren’t available through other relief programs, restoring both local livelihoods and food security in the process.
The devastating August 8, 2023, Maui wildfire was officially determined to be an accidental fire caused by electrical issues.
In response, Our Hawaiʻi / Lahaina Strong is helping redesign Maui’s entire electrical system in collaboration with local stakeholders, with a focus on environmentally efficient and solar-powered infrastructure.
By supporting organizations working on long-term infrastructure and recovery, you can help communities rebuild the physical foundations people rely on every day—and strengthen them for the fires and other disasters that may come next. If you want to get involved directly, look for local organizations leading rebuilding, debris removal, or home repair efforts in your community. You can also volunteer with organizations like All Hands and Hearts or your local Red Cross chapter when they are supporting long-term recovery.
After a disaster, communities can face a new threat: the rush of outside investors looking to buy up land while residents are displaced and vulnerable.
When people are forced to leave their homes, lose their livelihoods, or struggle to rebuild, profit-driven investors may see an opportunity to acquire land at the expense of the people who have called it home for generations. This can accelerate displacement and drive up costs, making it even harder for local residents to return.
In Maui, the Lahaina Community Land Trust is working to protect land from speculative investment and keep it in the hands of local communities. The organization acquires land and holds it in Trusts permanently, creating an alternative to selling property to investors and helping make housing more accessible to Lahaina families.
Supporting recovery isn’t only about helping communities rebuild what was lost. It’s also about protecting their ability to remain rooted.
A wildfire may last days, but recovery can take years. Communities may continue navigating displacement, rebuilding homes and businesses, processing grief, and adapting to a changing environment long after the initial response.
Staying connected matters. Continue learning from local leaders, supporting community organizations, and paying attention to what residents say they need as recovery evolves.
One of the clearest lessons we’ve learned from our nonprofit partners is that the people closest to a disaster are also the people best equipped to lead recovery. They know their communities, understand what’s needed as those needs evolve, and remain long after the headlines have faded.
GlobalGiving makes it safe and easy to support trusted, community-led organizations responding to wildfires around the world. Through our global network of vetted nonprofit partners, we listen to and work alongside organizations already on the ground to assess where funding can have the greatest impact, and quickly direct resources to the local leaders who are best positioned to respond.
When you give to the GlobalGiving Wildfire Emergency Response Fund, your donation helps us support trusted nonprofit partners before, during, and after wildfires. Funding can provide emergency shelter, food, clean water, medical care, and other immediate relief in the days following a fire. As communities move into recovery, it also helps local organizations rebuild homes and livelihoods, restore ecosystems, expand mental health services, and strengthen resilience for the future.
Every wildfire is different, but one thing remains constant: communities recover best when local organizations have the resources they need to lead.
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