DETROIT, March 26 – More than a dozen Detroit charities were grateful recipients of more than $400,000 in donations distributed from Mitch Albom’s “S.A.Y. (Super All Year) Detroit Radiothon.” The monies were collected in a single 15-hour broadcast last December at the Somerset Collection in Troy.
Albom handed out 14 oversized checks at a ceremony held at WJR Radio in Detroit’s FisherBuilding Wednesday morning. With him was Dr. Chad Audi of the Detroit Rescue Mission, which facilitates the “S.A.Y. Detroit” charity founded by Albom in 2006.
Representatives from charities that assist the homeless, working families, veterans, students, single mothers, and underprivileged children were on hand to share how they’ll use the funds. Below is a list of these groups, how much they received, and how the funds will help them:
- Detroit School of Arts Music Department ($5,000) – will provide dollies for 13 upright pianos as well as tuning and repair for 15 pianos regularly used by students.
- Public School Academies of Detroit ($10,000) – will fund travel for members of the debate team at UniversityPrepAcademy, whose goal is to attend at least six national tournaments in 2014 in the hope of obtaining a bid for the Tournament of Champions, the highest honor for high school students of debate.
- Real Life. My Music ($10,000) – will pay for a coordinator to oversee additional after school music and dance classes by allowing students access to the buildings after hours four days a week as opposed to two.
- Detroit Food & Entrepreneurship Academy ($10,000) – will allow students to work on their culinary projects in a licensed, commercial kitchen so they can begin selling their products at various markets and venues in and around Detroit.
- Ravendale Community, Inc. ($10,000) – will provide for new kitchen appliances in a new community center that is currently under renovation.
- Michigan Veterans Matter ($10,000) – will help provide shelter for 15 homeless veterans.
- Hope Village Detroit ($15,000) – will provide funds to transform a vacant house in Highland Park into a dream home for a single working mother who will then become a first-time homeowner.
- Cass Community Social Services ($20,000) – will help with the completion of a 13-apartment building that will house homeless individuals for life.
- Working Homes/Working Families ($20,000) – will allow the Detroit Rescue Mission to acquire several vacant homes in one neighborhood, renovate them, then give them to families that are working but struggling.
- C.O.T.S./Bright Beginnings ($25,000) – will allow for continued, safe, free daycare for infants whose mothers are looking for work.
- Time To Help ($15,000) – will help to supply and fund future monthly volunteer projects facilitated by the Detroit Rescue Mission that assist the homeless, veterans, and Detroit’s most needy. These include everything from re-stocking soup kitchens to beautifying neighborhoods.
- A Hole In The Roof ($20,000) – will provide funds for Mother Batie’s Soup Kitchen, which has fed Detroit’s hungry and assisted its underprivileged with finding jobs for more than 40 years.
- Detroit Dream Scholars ($30,000) – will allow the College For Creative Studies to provide two full scholarships for students who want to study the arts and who, in accepting these scholarships, agree to give back to their communities by creating and completing an art project of their choice.
- S.A.Y. Detroit Family Health Clinic ($140,000) – will help provide continued medical care for uninsured homeless children and their mothers in the country’s first-ever free clinic of its kind.
At the conclusion of the ceremony, charity reps gathered to discuss how they could work with one another to further strengthen their groups.
This year’s third annual “Mitch Albom S.A.Y. Detroit Radiothon” will be held 6 a.m. until 9 p.m. Thursday, December 4, again at Somerset Collection North in Troy. More than $400,000 was raised each of the first two years.
More Photos:
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March 26 ceremony at WJR Radio in Detroit.
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Albom, Antwan Price of Mother Batie's Kitchen, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Faith Fowler of Cass Community Social Services, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Trish Dewald of C.O.T.S./Bright Beginnings, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Liz Klos of the College For Creative Studies, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Jennifer Rusciano of the Detroit Food & Entrepreneurship Academy, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Kevin Ramsby of Hope Village Detroit, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Ken Leslie of Michigan Veterans Matter, and Dr. Audi
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Dr. Audi and Albom
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Mitch Albom speaks to grant recipients March 26 at WJR Radio in Detroit.
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Albom, Sharon Hopkins of Public School Academies of Detroit, and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Toni McIlwain of Ravendale Community, Inc., and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Lena Pernell of Real Life. My Music., and Dr. Audi
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Albom, Dr. Peggy Richardson of the S.A.Y. Detroit Family Health Clinic, and Dr. Audi
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Cheryl Valentine of Detroit School of Arts Music Department with Mitch Albom
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Albom, Jean Yee of Time To Help, and Dr. Audi
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Tom O'Brien, station manager of WJR Radio in Detroit
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Albom, Aurine Moore of Working Homes/Working Families, and Dr. Audi
