The News: We’re Moving Right Along!
- Great Garden Party, Sunday, June 26, at Labyrinth House with great entertainment and food and lots of great help! (See notes below). Many are showing interest in leadership whether at the board or team level. Now all the follow up and organizing remains to be done. If you took a volunteer sheet to think/pray over, please send it back to us! We are hoping to have a lot more in place by September and it’s like herding cats (ever tried it J?) to organize during the summer.
- Successful Garage Sale at the Public Market, Sunday, July 24th—again great help and many donations. We raised about $300. We’ve been informed by our helpers (and Jimmy) that this is the last garage sale! But we still had fun and got to talk to a lot of people about Project Empower.
- We have received and returned our NY SOARS (New York Supports Opportunities for Accessing Recovery Services) contract and hope to be up and running with this in August. There are practical hoops to jump through and lots of paper work. Our admin, Jessica Isaac, will be worth her weight in gold. Her processing of all the paper work will enable us to work with more people. Finally we will begin to receive compensation for some of our work!!!
- Lovely visit with Mary Hannick, 102 years old, who helped found Hannick Hall and Liberty Manor. I was delighted to find we had the same way of looking at people: “Never label anyone!” Mary strongly asserted. She likes that we try to avoid calling women addicts but chose to talk about women with addiction. What an inspiration! I think she has around 50 awards on her walls!
- Just received a grant from Spiritus Christi’s Tithing Committee and have a promise of another grant from the Molly Campbell Foundation for next month. Added together with some client fees and a retreat for the Christian Education Committee of Greece Baptist and a return from our fundraising letter—we’re moving ahead.
- We continue to follow up with women even after they relapse and continue to struggle. In a phone call to one of our women, she commented that someone asked her if anyone ever calls her just to see how she’s doing. “All I could think of was you, Joy.” We are meeting later this week!
- Please read the story, Today We Bought an Alarm Clock. The follow up, two weeks later: After group today our alarm clock receiver returned from drug court. The first thing out of her mouth was, “Thank you for the alarm clock!” I’ve been down here every morning at 8:00 o’clock. We talked about how I didn’t let her by with excuses, got her an alarm clock—that she is using daily to take responsibility for herself. Now, that’s empowering!
- Another woman asked about volunteering—we are creating a volunteer program for the women in recovery to help them build on their strengths, address their growth areas and find their “niche” in the world. Do you know how wonderful it is to hear women say, “I want to give back to the community?” Sounds like music in my years.
- Volunteers are stepping up, the new board of directors is filling out and we’re having a hard time keeping up. It appears that Joy will be offered more speaking opportunities and also will be invited to do workshops in various places!
Thank you, everyone, for your support and help. Thank you for your generosity—your dollars are stretched very far! We are grateful for your continued support. Please remember that you can donate by credit card on our website (www.projectempower.org). If you have not signed up for our Ezine, do so immediately to keep updates and juicy tidbits coming your way.
Thanks to our great volunteers!
Garden Party: Jessica Isaac & John Mazza, Ann & Jeff Nelson, Kathleen Robbins, Lynne Stewart, Leanna Shirley, Judy Carlotta, Lindsay Steinberg & Nick Obecanov, JP Simpson & Molly Phillips, Israel Skyy. Food donated by: Green Zebra Catering, Dolce Cupcakery, P&M Produce, Aladdins, Eco Bella, Judy Carlotta
Garage Sale at the Market: Jessica Isaac & John Mazza, Ann Nelson, Kathleen Robbins, Lynne Stewart, Leanna Shirley, Mary Zaepfel, Mark Zaepfel, Thanks to those who donated!
