An animal rescue organisation in Australia raised a record-breaking sum of over $100 million in donations following the devastating bushfires. Two years later, questions are raised: What happened to the money?
Lewis Hamilton, Barack Obama and Ellen DeGeneres all rallied support, raising large sums of money for a relatively unknown Australian animal rescue organisation. During the devastating „Black Summer“ in 2019 and 2020, when bushfires raged for weeks, NSW Wildlife Rescue and Education Service (WIRES) raised millions of dollars in donations. But while the fires have long been extinguished, WIRES is now facing a new challenge. The organisation has come under scrutiny for the way it is managing its funds.
Before the fires, WIRES was one of many wildlife rescue organisations operating in Australia. It routinely managed revenue of about 3 million Australian dollars per year. Harrowing images of burned kangaroos and koalas triggered a global wave of sympathy. In the financial years of 2020 and 2021 combined, WIRES raised a record amount of more than $100 million in donations. The money in their kitty had grown to roughly thirty times its previous amount.
Germany, USA, Australia: People from around the world rallied behind the cause, donating money to WIRES. But two years after the bushfires, several prominent figures within the wildlife sector are voicing concerns. Stephen Van Mil, an Australian vet and chief executive of the Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital, said he was frustrated with the organisation. „More than 24 months later and the money wasn’t spent where it should have been – saving wildlife,“ he said.
Van Mil also claims that WIRES declined to help with the hospital’s costs, despite repeatedly sending carers with injured wildlife to the clinic for free treatment. „We are the only dedicated hospital in New South Wales (NSW) that treats all and only Australian wildlife, and WIRES is an organisation based in NSW,“ he said. Van Mil said he believes the interest WIRES has accrued on the donations by now would be enough to build another wildlife hospital.
Byron Bay Wildlife Hospital is the first mobile wildlife hospital in Australia and was financed through donations after the fires. Van Mil explained that the hospital needed $1.3 million annually to keep its doors open.
Financial documents filed by WIRES show that it raised $102.4 million in donations in the financial years 2020 and 2021. $90.4 million of those funds flowed into a bushfire emergency fund. The emergency fund was set up in late 2019 and closed in mid-2020. At the end of the 2021 financial year, the emergency fund was still at a balance of about $77.3 million. In total, WIRES still held a position of approximately $87.2 million in donations.
WIRES disputed suggestions it had failed to spend most of the bushfire funds. Chief executive officer Leanne Taylor said to t-online: „The WIRES emergency fund was created to respond to the compounded disasters experienced by wildlife through the preceding long-running drought, fires, and extreme weather events.“
„It should be noted that WIRES has only ever been an NSW wildlife rescue organisation; however, as custodians of these unprecedented donations, we made a commitment in January 2020 that we would also provide support to the wildlife sector nationally, and we continue to do. We also communicated that the donations would be used for both short-term emergency response and long-term recovery plans – and our actions and intent have not wavered,“ she wrote.
