Funds available to help impacted residents after chemical fire

Residents in Winston-Salem who were forced to leave their homes after a chemical fire can now get some help with their evacuation expenses.

City officials recently announced that the Winston Weaver Fertilizer Plant designated $100,000 dollars to assist with community relief efforts.

So far, the Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest North Carolina received a quarter of that pot. The organization provided meals to families and first responders during the emergency.

A local nonprofit called Love Out Loud has been allocated $50,000. Those funds will be used to directly reimburse those impacted for hotel and other expenses incurred during the evacuation period. They will need to provide proof of residency and receipts.

Liz Miller, with Love Out Loud, says their phone has been ringing off of the hook.

"A lot of the people in the evacuation zone are already individuals that are living at or below the poverty rate, so they don't have just kind of this liquid cash to go stay at a hotel for four nights or go eat out for four days, so the need is definitely great," says Miller.

Residents can call or go to Love Out Loud's website to submit a reimbursement form.

More than 6,000 people were in the one-mile evacuation zone after a fire broke out on January 31 at the Winston Weaver plant.

Miller says her organization expects the need for assistance will be more than what funds are available, and they will be looking for more resources to help fill in the gaps.

Follow WFDD's Keri Brown on Twitter @kerib_news