VingCard Elsafe Providing Emergency Support to Hotels Hit By Hurricanes Katrina and Rita
Security Recovery Teams are heading for hotels in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas that nee
DALLAS, TX, September 30, 2005. VingCard Elsafe is embarking on an emergency support mission to assist more than 400 of its hurricane-affected customer hotels in securing their properties and regaining full use of their VingCard electronic-locking system and/or Elsafe in-room safes. The four-state support effort, coordinated by all departments in the corporate office, will begin today in Mississippi and will conclude once all hotels have been visited.
"VingCard Elsafe is dispatching a team of technicians armed with replacement parts to visit all of our customer hotels in the Emergency Declaration States of Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas," said George Winker, VP of North American Operations for VingCard Elsafe. "Our goal is to secure and stabilize hotels with minor malfunctions and help others which need complete electronic lock and in-room safe system overhauls so that they can reopen their doors. We know who and where our customers are, but we don't know the extent of the damage sustained at each property.
"Any hotel with a VingCard or Elsafe system - which has special requests or urgent needs - should contact us right away at (800) 225-8464 so that we can prioritize service and dispatch our Security Recovery Team accordingly," he said. "Our immediate goal is to re-establish a secure environment so that our customer hotels can begin providing accommodations to evacuees and emergency contractors."
According to the American Hotel & Lodging Association, evacuees are currently living in hotels in 42 states and 250 shelters, and approximately 17,000 American Red Cross staff and volunteers are in place. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security estimates that an additional 250,000 guestrooms are needed.
"With tens-of-thousands of individuals displaced from their homes and thousands of disaster relief workers beginning to converge on these areas, there is a great need for temporary housing and other assistance," Winker said. "The VingCard Elsafe Security Recovery Team is on its way to help hoteliers in rebuilding their businesses and evacuees in rebuilding their lives."
Hotel Assistance Available
The American Hotel & Lodging Association is working closely with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) on the Long-Term Hurricane Survivor Housing Assistance Program. To date, approximately 4,000 properties have contacted AH&LA. FEMA is first seeking contracts with hotels in the states that have received emergency declarations for evacuees, but is willing and eager to contract with hotels throughout the country.
AH&LA has established a Hurricane Katrina Information section on www.ahla.com as a portal for support and news on housing, employment, taxes, insurance, loans, benefits, consultation services, legal updates and other resources.
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