Dispatch Media Group - Everyday Heroes of Central Ohio 2018

E V E R Y D AY

HEROES he

Meet t

5

S t S i l fina

tS al Ohio S i l a n Emifi r in Centr

S e life bette +20 k ho ma w

A Dispatch Media Group publication

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$5.99 | 2018

8/23/18 5:13 PM

Be an EVERYDAY HERO for our community!

Support the real-time needs of local nonprofits to help strengthen central Ohio. columbusfoundation.org/bettertogether

No credit card fees through 2018!

JOIN US, AND LET’S BE BETTER TOGETHER!

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Saluting Our Everyday Heroes

We’ve Got Our Members’ Backs!

We’re proud to support our heroes in our community!

Since 1935 CME has been helping our members reach

• • • •

Mortgages Home Equity Loans Checking & Savings Low Rate Auto Loans

• Health Savings Accounts • Insurance & Investments � ����������� ��� Money Markets

Clintonville - 4545 N. High St. Downtown - 365 S. 4th St. Hilliard - 4099 Trueman Blvd.

Pickerington- 1017 Refugee Rd. Westerville - 428 S. State St.

888.224.3108 • 614.224.8890 • www.cmefcu.org Nominate a hero. Visit localhometownhero.com

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EvEryDay

letter to the Community

HEroEs

a Dispatch Media Group publication

Get ready to meet the

EvEryday HEroEs of Central ohio.

62 E. Broad St. Columbus, Ohio 43215 614-888-4567

President Bradley M. Harmon

2018

Their stories are powerful and inspiring.

Publisher/Dispatch Magazines ray Paprocki

And we’re excited to share them with you.

This is the 2018 class of Everyday Heroes, who quietly work to heal, unite and improve our communities.

EDITORIAL Editor alan Miller

In the spring, we asked for nominations to recognize members of the Columbus area whose extraordinarily selfless acts set them apart in these divisive times.

After reviewing the nominations, our panel of judges selected five finalists and 20 semifinalists.

Each will be honored at a luncheon on Sept. 18 in the Boat House restaurant, with one finalist being named the Dispatch Media Group Hero.

We applaud our sponsors—the Columbus Foundation, the United Way of Central Ohio and CME Federal Credit Union—for supporting our second annual event.

To highlight the achievements of these Everyday Heroes, we also created this special publication through the combined efforts of The Columbus Dispatch, ThisWeek Community News and Dispatch Magazines.

You will learn about a nurse practitioner’s compassion to keep patients from being marginalized; a “gear-head” who changes lives with modified go-karts; an emergency department physician who reaches teens to prevent drug abuse; a Clintonville resident who instills a giving spirit in children. And so many more.

We are grateful—and in awe—of their contributions.

Bradley M. Harmon

Ray Paprocki

President Dispatch Media Group

Publisher Dispatch Magazines

Contributing writers andrew atkins Summer Cartwright Kevin Corvo Owen Daugherty Nate Ellis alan Froman Chris Gaitten Suzanne Goldsmith Ken Gordon Sheridan Hendrix Julanne Hohbach andrew King Marla K. Kuhlman

Contributing editors Lee Cochran Kelly Lecker Eric Lyttle

abbey Marshall Kevin Parks rita Price Gary Seman Jr. Chloe Skaar Sarah Sole Kevin Stankiewicz Chloe Teasley Erica Thompson Lillian van Wyngaarden Kelley youman Holly Zachariah

Contributing photographers Eric albrecht Tim Johnson adam Cairns Jonathan Quilter Lorrie Cecil Kyle robertson Shane Flanigan Fred Squillante rob Hardin

DESIGN & PRODUCTION Production and Design Director Craig rusnak Designer Michaela Schuett

ADVERTISING

EvEryday HEroEs LUNCHEoN

Individual tickets are $25 Tables of eight are available for $175 Tickets available at Dispatch.com/HeroesTickets SPONSOrS:

The Boat House at Confluence Park Tuesday, September 18 11:30 a.M. to 1 P.M.

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Sales Director Craig Foglietti

MARKETING

Marketing Director Eric Wygle

Everyday Heroes is published

by GateHouse Media, LLC. all contents of this magazine are copyrighted © 2018, all rights reserved. reproduction or use, without written permission, of editorial or graphic content in any manner is prohibited.

Publisher assumes no responsibility for return of unsolicited materials.

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All Kids Should Know What A Full Tummy Feels Like...

Yet 1 in 4 children in central Ohio doesn’t know where their next meal is coming from. Help us get fresh produce from the fields into the tummies of your hungry neighbors.

EAT DIRT. DIG IN. DONATE. midohiofoodbank.org/eatdirt

IN PROMOTIONAL PARTNERSHIP WITH

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28 30

62 64

6

Derek DeHart Streamlining DACA

32 ryaN Squier Nix Opiates

56 amber HuDSoN Food and support for vets

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Durya NaDeem Promoting Peace

34 braD HutcHiNSoN Patron of Fairfield County

58 SiSter NaDiNe bucHaNaN Savior of the streets

10 racHel muHa Run the Race Center

38 robiN baker The spirit of neighborliness

62 JeNNiFer HaNSeN Healing with horses

14 robert avery Firefighters 4 Kids

40 mimi rivarD Nurse to the trans community

64 Scott vaNDerkarr Creator of drug courts

16 lyDia StrauSS Tireless volunteer

42 mariaN Stuckey Care for those in crisis

18 rob ScHeNz Beneficent barbecue

44 tom FiSH Serving disabled youth

20 DiaNe ewalD Helping Hands

46 babette Feibel Filling gaps in Family Recovery Court

22 braNDy Jemczura Seeds of Caring 26 Nikki mccartHy Sam’s Fans

50 alma SaNtoS The soul of the Hispanic community

28 rocky GrimeS Heart of Unlimited Boundaries

52 aNamarie rayburN Ovarian cancer’s nemesis 54 bill PoHl Smoke detectors for everyone

30 Pat aNDrewS Dress for Success

Jacquie ayres CME Federal Credit Union Suzanne Goldsmith Columbus Monthly rachel kilroy Columbus Dispatch Scot kirk Columbus Dispatch alan miller Columbus Dispatch ray Paprocki Dispatch Magazines renna Schafler 2017 Everyday Heroes top winner Glenn Skeen United Way of Central Ohio Dwight Smith Columbus Foundation erica thompson Columbus Alive

FINALISTS

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JuDGeS

Photos: Left to right, KyLe robertson, fred squiLLante, tim Johnson, adam cairns

contents

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DOMINICAN SISTERS OF PEACE SISTERS AND ASSOCIATES IN MISSION

ABOUT US

The Dominican Sisters of Peace are grateful to the saints next door who improve, heal, and unite our communities. Our Sisters in Ohio and around the world build peace through ecological, educational, social and healthcare programs that bring the love of Christ to all people.

HUMAN TRAFFICKING: SISTER NADINE BUCHANAN

is one of many Dominican Sisters who bring comfort and aid to women trapped in sexual slavery, or labor trafficking.

ECOLOGY: SHEPHERD’S CORNER

in Blacklick, OH, is one of five ecology ministries founded by the Dominican Sisters of Peace. Shepherd’s Corner offers environmental education and enriching, renewing outdoor experiences. Shepherd’s Corner also supplies fresh, naturally-grown produce to Central Ohio food pantries.

RETREAT CENTERS: THE MARTIN DE PORRES CENTER

in Columbus, OH, is a safe, peaceful space dedicated to spirituality, education and the arts. The Center focuses on building peace by serving our community with education assistance, leadership training and respectful dialogue.

EDUCATION: THE DOMINICAN LEARNING CENTER

in Columbus, OH, helps under-served adult learners move to economic and social self-sufficiency.

Learners and volunteer tutors work one-on-one to improve Math/Reading/Writing and computer skills.

English or Spanish language GED and ESL classes are offered as well.

Thank you to all volunteers who help make our city a more peaceful place!

If you want to volunteer at one of our ministries or support the Dominican Sisters of Peace, please visit our website at oppeace.org, or follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

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Help for DACA AppliCAnts

Derek DeHart a newsletter item anD a little tecHnological know-How gives birtH to a social enterprise

by Chloe Teasley coluMbus ceo

Photo by Tim Johnson Dispatch Magazines

It was an idea that took root innocuously enough. Derek DeHart, a product manager at CoverMyMeds by day, was scrolling through the TechLife Columbus newsletter in 2016 when he stumbled upon a mention of an event called GiveBackHack, a weekend happening connecting tech and social impact projects.

He couldn’t go that year, but he made a point to attend in 2017 and he says, without hyperbole, that it changed his life.

“We’ve had volunteer product designers involved, we’ve had a volunteer graphic designer involved, we’ve had volunteer developers involved at various stages,” says DeHart. “We can’t pay software engineers today, it’s not something we have the operating capital for, but nevertheless, it’s a problem that people recognize can be solved through technology and they’re very interested in learning how they can contribute.”

“It opened my eyes to this whole world, this whole ecosystem of social entrepreneurship and business leaders who are running a business effectively, but nevertheless trying to do good in their communities and do right by their stakeholders. I had no idea they existed,” DeHart said.

DeHart is also a founding board member of the local chapter of Conscious Capitalism, an international organization that encourages for-profits to be “conscious businesses” in recognizing how they can help their communities. DeHart also organized 2018’s GiveBackHack, which ran from April 27-29. Right now, his life consists of working at CoverMyMeds, logging off-work hours for DACA Time and “helping the Columbus business community have a vocabulary to think about and talk about what it means to be a conscious business.”

The change came when he heard the pitch for DACA Time made by co-founders Brook Kohn and Nathali Bertran. The idea behind DACA is to provide a secure online tool that helps walk people through the complicated process of applying for protection under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals immigration policy. After hearing the pitch, he joined up with the two.

“It was really happenstance: I saw it, and the description of a launchpad for social innovation really resonated with me,” DeHart said of GiveBackHack. “It was such an elegant solution. … I recognized immediately the elegance of the solution and the prevalence of the problem, and so we got to work on it through the weekend,” he adds. After GiveBackHack—where DACA Time received a small amount of seed funding—it went through the SEA Change accelerator and gained additional resources and $40,000 in funding.

As co-founder and COO of DACA Time, DeHart, 37, gives his time and energy to the nonprofit on nights and weekends. His primary goal is to find tech experts in the community who are willing to do the same thing. DACA Time runs almost entirely upon the generosity of volunteers.

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DeHart doesn’t think DACA Time will ever be something he can draw a paycheck from, and that’s OK with him—“It’s a labor of love,” he says. But now DeHart says he’s been thinking about other holes in the community that can be filled by social enterprise.

“I don’t have a fully formed or concrete idea of something I’d want to do, but it’s clear that there are additional needs in our community that can be served,” he says. “I’d like to unpack some of that and see if there is any supplementary programming or more that we could do through various partnerships to help fill some of those gaps.”

DeHart sees his volunteer efforts as a way to give back to a community he has greatly benefitted from. “I’m really happy to give back,” he says. “I’m honored that someone would consider my desire to give back to community in any way heroic, but in my mind it’s just feeding back into the same ecosystem that’s given me such a wonderful opportunity to enrich my life.” 

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SEMIFInalISt GiveBackHack provided the outlet for an idea that he thought could help, capitalizing on his own technological skills.

Derek DeHart teamed up with a project in its infancy that has turned into a much-used website for DaCa applicants.

SEPTEMBER 2018

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SEMIFInalISt Durya Nadeem founded PeaceBuilders to help bridge the gap of understanding between cultures.

“I know I can change how someone sees things in life.”

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Breaking Barriers, Building Bridges

Durya NaDeem HilliarD Darby graDuate promotes peace by reacHiNg out to people of otHer faitHs

by KeVin CORVO ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Durya Nadeem didn’t know what to say when a Hilliard Darby High School classmate abruptly told her that “all Muslims are terrorists.” But it didn’t take long for her to find her voice and the fortitude later the same day to invite him to attend the Interfaith March for Peace & Justice, a national event for which she was recruiting local participants in March 2017. She said the student apologized for the remark, and a year later, he was among those who attended her high school graduation party.

“I know I can change how someone sees things in life,” said Nadeem, 17, a Hilliard resident and Ohio State University student.

That outlook led Nadeem to found Peace-Builders, an affiliate of the Interfaith Association of Central Ohio. Peace-Builders is a “group of young people (ages 13-24) … (who) strive for a unified nation by breaking chains of intolerance and building bridges among different cultures and religions through positive communications and interactions,” according to its website.

Nadeem said she is the first person in her family born in the U.S. after her parents and older sister emigrated from Pakistan.

“We can all be closer if we talk with each other instead of about each other,” she said.

Nadeem, who attends the Noor Islamic Cultural Center in Dublin, began reaching out to the youths and young adults at other local places of worship, such as the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus, the First Community Church and the Turkish American Society of Ohio.

Peace-Builders first met in February 2017 and continues to meet about twice a month at restaurants or a member’s house, Nadeem said. The monthly gatherings allow core members to plan the organization’s larger events, such as the Interfaith March for Peace & Justice, Nadeem said.

Photo by Shane Flanigan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Several hundred people attended this year’s march April 29 at Genoa Park in Columbus. It was held at 4 p.m. but marches were held at earlier times in other time zones “so all of us across America were raising our voices at the same exact time,” Nadeem said. This year’s march was meant to raise awareness about and prevent bullying, and last year’s was aimed at stopping hate crimes.

Nadeem said her motivation to create Peace-Builders is grounded in her upbringing.

“Humbleness, peace and acceptance are [some of] my core beliefs,” she said. “If I was ever feeling left out, sometimes in elementary school, my parents reminded me [of those core beliefs].”

Muhammad Nadeem, Durya’s father, said his daughter believes “actions speak louder than words.”

“As she continues to touch the hearts of hundreds with her eloquent speeches of unity and equality, she also acts upon her words and is extremely involved with community service, youth empowerment and interfaith communications,” he said.

“Peace-Builders is one of many things Durya has done in order to get her message across about looking past people’s societal identities and realizing their humanity.”

Nadeem plans to study pharmaceutical sciences and world politics at Ohio State, but she also plans to continue her work with Peace-Builders.

“I want to help the new generation in the United States to be one family,” Nadeem said. “Although we may read different holy books and call God by different names, inside each and every one of us we have one heart that can love.

“Love does not see color, races or features. Love sees people. Where there is love, there is balance and harmony in the world.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Providing A sAfe sPAce

Rachel Muha Son’S MuRdeR giveS RiSe to a centeR foR youth

by ERica THompson coluMbus alive

As a mom, Rachel Muha has grown accustomed to a certain daily routine. After school, her kids greet her and sit around the table, venting about their day. They raid the pantry for fruit rollups, pudding cups or granola bars.

If they don’t have homework, the boys go off and play basketball, while the girls play checkers or card games.

Later, they eat dinner together as a family.

It’s a rather typical experience for the average parent, with one exception: Muha has more than 50 kids.

She’s the founder of The Run the Race Center, an afterschool and summer program for inner-city youths, ages 5 and up, on the West Side of Columbus. Since its inception in 2005, Muha estimates she has served between 400 and 500 students. Up to 80 kids might come through the center on a given day during the school year.

And she is a mother figure to them all, as Run the Race staff members Cassie Seymore and Andrea Henderson can attest. Now 21, both women began hanging out at the center at age 7.

“It was an organization that I never even witnessed before,” said Seymore. “You have your rec centers, but that’s totally different. … It’s like a family environment.”

“I wanted to work here full time because I’ve seen what the center has done for me, so I wanted to be a part of helping other kids,” Henderson added.

“I know that everybody loves me [and] everybody appreciates me,” said Daniel Houston, 19, another longtime attendee who now works at the center. “I’m always happy here. You can never have a bad day.”

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Photos by Rob HaRdin Dispatch Magazines

Though Run the Race is designed to be a second home, it offers much more than the young people have access to at their residences. The spacious brick building includes a library, music room, tumbling room, game room, full basketball court and even a salon where kids can get facials and manicures. Twice a week during the summer, the children spend a day at the organization’s 8-acre farm in Galloway, growing fruits and vegetables and tending to chickens, ducks, goats and pigs.

Spiritual guidance is also part of Run the Race’s mission. There are crosses on the walls, and multiple rooms are affiliated with different patron saints, printed on a placard near the door. During some meals, Muha will tell a story from the Bible, though she said children of all beliefs visit the center and are not pushed to convert.

But it was Muha’s faith that got her through a personal tragedy, which spurred her to open The Run the Race Center. On May 31, 1999, her 18-year-old son, Brian, and his friend, Aaron Land, were kidnapped near Franciscan University of Steubenville and driven to Pennsylvania, where they were murdered.

“He died in a really violent way,” Muha said of her son, who attended Franciscan University and wanted to become a pediatrician. “We had to search for Brian for a week because Terrell and Nathan would not tell us where Brian was. And during that whole week … I knew what I was supposed to do, which was to forgive.”

“The minute you are willing to forgive, it changes everything,” she continued. “I wanted to know what their life was like. And why did they do what they did?”

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Finalist “Everyone comes into the world with hopes and desires and possibilities ... they deserve good upbringings.”

Rachel Muha’s Run the Race Center has served nearly 500 West Side youths with its summer and afterschool programming.

SEPTEMBER 2018

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Muha learned her son’s killers grew up in unstable environments with family members who were in and out of prison.

They dropped out of school and fell into criminal activity. Both were sentenced to life in prison for the murders.

Rachel Muha

“Everyone comes into the world with hopes and desires and possibilities,” Muha said. “They deserve good upbringings so that they can do what God wants them to do with their lives. ... I guess you could say [Terrell and Nathan] were our motivation.”

Age: 65 Neighborhood: Westerville Who inspires her? Jesus Christ inspires me, sustains me, motivates me, gives me all the strength I need.

Muha established the Brian Muha Foundation and set up scholarship funds for Franciscan University and Brian’s high school alma mater, St. Charles Preparatory School. Inspired by Hebrews 12:1 — “Throw aside every encumbrance that clings and persevere in running the race that lies ahead” — she started The Run the Race Center in the basement of Holy Family Church on West Broad Street. Her intention was to serve second and third graders once a week.

What keeps her engaged?

Looking at the faces of the young people who come to the center, hearing their stories and knowing they are so hopeful and so anxious to have the life God wants them to have — that is what keeps me engaged. I love them.

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ABOVE: Rachel Muha

(standing, center) with Run the Race students and former students who have returned to become employees at the center.

RIGHT: A small memorial reminding Rachel Muha (top) of her son, Brian, who was murdered in 1999 at the age of 18, inspiring her to create a safe summer and after-school space for youths.

“We put fliers all over the place,” she said. “We told schools about it. We expected this big influx of children and one little girl named Patty showed up. And within 15 minutes, Patty was telling us what to do.”

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Seven-year-old Patty had visions of meeting every day and going on field trips. She brought her friends, including Seymore and Henderson. The center kept moving and growing, settling into its current building six years ago.

“Rachel has a positive impact on the children,” said Sandra Bonneville, who began volunteering at the center five years ago. “She remembers each and every child’s name. She listens to them, supports their needs [and] encourages them to make good, healthy, moral choices. … [She] is uplifting the Hilltop community.”

It’s volunteers like Bonneville, and individual donors, who keep the center operating. “There’s so many good people out there. They just want to know how they can help,” Muha said.

“I’ll put something on Facebook now, [like], ‘A family needs a washing machine.’ And I’ll get a washing machine, a dryer, a refrigerator, a couch. People just want to give. It’s beautiful.”

Muha further assists “racers” and their families through a land contract program, buying fixer-uppers on the West Side. The kids help spruce them up, and Run the Race contracts them to families for a low price. (Muha does not make a profit.)

“These are families who have been renting their whole lives, never dreamed they could own a house, and in 10 or 15 years, the house is theirs,” Muha said. “And their monthly payment is lower than what their rent has been. … It keeps them in one neighborhood.”

Overall, Muha’s generosity is rewarded by the young people in a way that is less quantifiable.

“You think you’re never going to want to love anyone deeply [again] because it hurts if something happens,” she said. “And so you guard your heart. And you become a little less attached.”

“They’ve expanded my heart,” she continued. “They have all become my children. I love them as much as I love Brian and my other son, Chris. So they’ve helped me a lot.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Building a Better World

RobeRt AveRy A Columbus fiRefighteR’s dediCAtion to his Community tAkes the foRm of smAll ACts of kindness foR the people in need he Comes ACRoss eveRy dAy.

by Chris GaiTTen

Photo by Tim Johnson

columbus monthly

dispatch magazines

Next March, Robert Avery will reach the quarter-century milestone in his firefighting career. He runs into burning buildings while everyone else is running out, said Brandy Avery, his wife.

Yet that’s not why she nominated him for recognition. Instead, she’s impressed by his selfless, charitable gestures for people on the streets, neighborhood kids and anyone else he encounters.

As the father of a 10-year-old son and a 13-year-old daughter, Rob has a soft spot for children. Earlier in his career, he began volunteering with Firefighters 4 Kids, and then, in 2009, he started Jingle Mix & Mingle, a toy drive that benefits families who make more money than certain charitable eligibility requirements allow but still struggle to make ends meet. His toy drive also specializes in providing gifts for older children and teenagers, who are often overlooked by charities. Jingle Mix & Mingle works with Firefighters 4 Kids, the United Way, the Columbus Urban League, Maryhaven and social workers, and has provided toys for more than 175 children each of the last three years, Brandy says.

Rob is especially passionate about helping kids in the Olde Towne East neighborhood where he’s lived since 2003, serving as the positive role model that some lack. He gives them chores to earn money, trying to show them early on that cash won’t just fall from the trees. Some of them are deprived of resources and will have to work even harder than everyone else, he said, so he wants to teach them discipline and responsibility. Sometimes he just talks to them about what’s going on in their lives and tries to get them to see beyond where they are right now. At the Feddersen Community Center near Northern Lights, he encourages kids to better themselves, and he’s coached basketball there as well. He also talks to young adults about pursuing careers in firefighting.

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“He’s just got a good heart and [is] always willing to try to help someone out if need be,” said Tommy Brown, the manager of Fedderson. Brown grew up with Rob, and the two attended the same elementary school near Linden. To Rob, there’s nothing remarkable about his altruism because it’s just how they were raised. Both men’s families shared food and hospitality with anyone who stopped by or needed it. Rob’s stepfather—who cared for him when his biological father wasn’t around—was like the neighborhood dad. It was the proverbial village.

“And that’s what I don’t think we have right now,” Rob said. “The people in the village don’t take care of the village no more.”

In his unassuming way, he has set out to affect change one person at a time. Brown said he’s watched Rob give away his meal to a homeless person who looked hungry on several occasions as they dined around town. If someone approaches and asks for money, Rob finds work they can do, whether it’s picking up trash on the street or pulling weeds from around the Avery’s home, and rewards them for their efforts. He’s given money to help sustain a lot of people whose problems are beyond their control. It’s economic empowerment, his wife said.

“He never sees a person who he’s down on or he’s hard on,” Brandy said. “He always gives them some type of light to kind of get them through their day, no matter if they’re homeless, no matter if they’re a young kid.”

Rob’s hope is that the people he helps pay it forward to others.

It’s not heroism; it’s a simple model for improving the world. “I don’t look at it like I’m doing anything really special, I just think that’s what we all should do,” he said. “I think if everybody did that, then hey, it might be a better place to live.” 

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SEMIFInalISt Rob is especially passionate about helping kids ... serving as the positive role model that some lack.

Columbus firefighter Robert Avery started Jingle Mix & Mingle, a holiday toy drive that has served more than 175 youths each of the last three years.

SEPTEMBER 2018

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SEMIFInalISt Lydia Strauss has three jobs and still devotes time to more than a dozen charitable organizations.

Physically being there for someone lets them know they matter.

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Being there

Lydia StrauSS tireLeSS voLunteer divideS time among 13 charitabLe organizationS and three jobS

by Summer Cartwright The Columbus DispaTCh

Lydia Strauss will be there when you need her. Even when you think she won’t have time, she’ll come. She has time for three jobs. She has time for 13 charitable organizations. She has time for her husband. She has time for you.

To Strauss, physically being there for someone lets them know they matter. What some might call issues, such as addiction and mental illness, she calls layers. Every human has layers, Strauss explains, just as every human wants to feel understood.

Photo by Jonathan Quilter The Columbus DispaTCh

makes Strauss stand out, said Goldstein.

“We live in a world that’s incredibly fast; it’s easy to make judgements and harder to find time to help people,” he said. “Our lives are better because she is here.”

Strauss also gives in unconventional ways, like bringing food from events she’s catered to people living on the streets.

She helps clients at Dress for Success and talks with sexual assault survivors at SARNCO—the OhioHealth Sexual Assault Response Network of Central Ohio.

“I think it takes an absolute special person to do that,” said Molly Preston, manager of community engagement at Dress for Success. “And I think that’s what she was meant to do. It’s something very rare.”

That small silver watch with the navy analog screen on her wrist is there to ensure she’s on time. The pens in her car are used to jot down shifts she manages at homeless shelters and time slots when she delivers donations.

Strauss has two cars because she drives so many miles bringing donations to others. One is an old car that belonged to her husband, Matthew O’Kane. It’s a white Ford Escape, which she calls the Goodness Wagon.

Strauss empowers women at Girls on the Run and Planned Parenthood, she helps human trafficking survivors through the Salvation Army and she also cares for animals with Canine Companions.

In the Goodness Wagon, there’s always something to give. It’s so packed that the back seats are folded down for about a third of every month, she said.

Strauss, a Worthington resident who spends more days a week volunteering than not, lives a life that is truly for others. In addition to her job with SARNCO, Strauss works with an independent living program for individuals with disabilities and in event management at Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center.

Last winter, a woman came into a shelter where Strauss was volunteering. The woman was shoeless and there was snow on the ground. The woman was carrying boots, which were sopping wet from being outside for so long.

One time she built a changing room for a client while volunteering at Dress for Success, said Matthew Goldstein, the executive director of BESA, a nonprofit organizer for charities. The woman she helped was uncomfortable and nervous. She didn’t want to be surrounded by others while finding work clothes.

“She needed someone to meet her,” Strauss, 47, would later say in an email to Goldstein. “My win was being there for a special client who needed listened to. Really listened to.”

That belief that everyone deserves to feel special is what

Strauss went to her car and got out a pair of boots someone had donated. But those shoes didn’t fit the woman. Strauss reevaluated and slipped off her brand new white sneakers. It was the first day she’d worn them.

That gesture wasn’t grand to Strauss. It was just what was needed.

Because to Strauss, no one thing belongs to just one person. Anything can be given to another who needs it more. Time, patience, possessions, they’re all the same. They’re for others.

“Those shoes weren’t meant for me,” she said. “They were meant for her, and I was just the keeper of them.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Hot for fundraising

rob Schenz Specialty GaS Foundation Founder SpreadS meSSaGe oF philanthropy throuGh barbecue

by GArY SeMAN Jr. ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Photo by Lorrie CeCiL ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

It started in 2007, when the Ohio State University Buckeye Barbeque Club was holding its annual fundraiser for the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and asked Rob Schenz for help.

The first time he donated propane at cost. After that, it was free.

Then he became a sponsor.

“What kind of struck me with them was their philanthropic spirit,” said Schenz, owner of Specialty Gas House and Specialty Gas Services, both located at 4800 Indianola Ave. in Clintonville.

The business sells grills, fire pits, fireplaces and related merchandise and services to install or repair those items.

These days, one could say Schenz can’t stop giving. He has formed the Specialty Gas Foundation, a charitable organization that gives away all of the money it earns.

rob schenz, owner of Specialty Gas house in Clintonville, gives a 10-percent discount to any customer who brings in 10 non-perishable food items, in addition to many other charitable contributions.

Egg Fest, where several teams use Big Green Egg domed grills to compete for prizes. Schenz supplies the new grills. Teams can buy the grill or simply cook on them. Spectators pay $25 admission.

Over the years, he’s given about $177,000 and 100,000 pounds of food to various charities that help veterans, families of fallen law enforcement officers, cancer sufferers and the hungry.

Another annual barbecue competition, held in May at the Tremont Center in Upper Arlington, raises money for the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, which includes the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute.

“It’s feel-good stuff for all involved,” said Schenz, 51, a Sunbury resident. “Not only is it good for business, it’s just good business.

It’s giving back to the community. It’s giving back to the causes we’re passionate about.”

Every day at Specialty Gas House is a “10 for 10” discount. Those who bring in 10 non-perishable items for the ClintonvilleBeechwold Community Resources Center get a 10 percent price break on merchandise at the store.

Barbecuing definitely has become an important part of the mission, Schenz said. One his biggest fundraisers of the year is the Ohio

“More small businesses should do this,” he said of philanthropic giving. “They’d see the return both in feeling good and business.”

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SEMIFInalISt “Rob pays forward in such a way that others cannot help but follow his lead.”

During grilling season, Fridays are reserved for low-key cookouts in the Specialty Gas House parking lot. Burgers, soft drinks and a bag of chips are served for $5. The money is given to veterans’ groups unless, on the first Friday, another charity is suggested, Schenz said.

“If they want to throw something else in there, if they want to throw a $20 in there, I won’t complain,” he said.

a family member there,” Bobulski said. “Rob pays forward in such a way that others cannot help but follow his lead. Just an example, he has inspired our granddaughters (Kylie, 12, and Alexi, 11) in the value of paying forward in our community when they attend one of his events.”

Schenz remains humble in his quest to help others.

Bobulski said Schenz gets his employees involved, while they’re on the time clock, to help and come up with their own ideas.

“All the stuff I do, I don’t do it for recognition,” Schenz said. “It’s something that helps me lay my head on my pillow at night and know I’ve done good.”

“He’s a small-business owner,” Bobulski said. “He’s not a big-box store. His passion and enthusiasm of the small-business owner goes behind his small business.”

Hank Bobulski, a Gahanna resident and customer of Specialty Gas House, nominated Schenz for the award. “You have to understand, you don’t just become a customer, you become

“He creates events of all sorts that are magnets that bring people together for fun and activities and ultimately enhance the community,” Bobulski said.  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Supplying StudentS

Diane ewalD westerville resiDent’s talents translate to respect for those in neeD

by MArLA K. KUHLMAN ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Westerville resident Diane Ewald wants children to have equal opportunities.

Through Harlem Township Helping Hands, chartered under the Harlem Township Civic Association, she helps coordinate a back-to-school event at the end of July so students in the Big Walnut Local School District start the new year with everything they need.

“It’s a summer program where we do the one-stop, back-toschool,” she said. “We have a station and give away new shoes.

The child has to be there. We fit them. We also have a station where we do the basics—underwear, socks, hoodies.”

The event is held at Church of the Saviour United Methodist in Westerville.

“We’ll give out toiletries to put in a backpack for gym,” Ewald said. “United Way of Delaware County comes in. They (students) get basic supplies.”

Ewald, 64, said she just wants to make sure children have a measure of dignity when they go back to classes.

“You can start out on the same foot as everyone,” she said.

“There’s a measure of respect in there that I think everyone deserves. That keeps me going.”

Ewald said she has been helping local children for quite a while through Harlem Township Helping Hands. She also helps supply coats, hats and gloves for children in need at Christmas. Ewald said 130 children were assisted in the school program last year and 80 received help at the holidays.

“There was a resident of our township who kind of collaborated with a first-grade teacher at (Hylen) Souders Elementary,” Ewald said. “I worked with her, and it blossomed from there. I’ve been doing this for more than 20 years.”

Ewald said she believes in the program and credits volunteer Teri Farina for support.

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Photo by Lorrie CeCiL ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

“We’ve worked in tandem throughout the years,” she said.

“Every year she’s ready to go. She’s just as much a part of making sure the kids are taken care of as I am. Volunteers come and go, and she has stuck with me. We’ve been a dynamic duo.”

Ewald, who works in retail, often uses her employee discount at Kohl’s to purchase items for the children.

She said the summer program is also made possible thanks to contributors to Harlem Township Helping Hands.

“It’s a community thing that they take care of each other,” Ewald said. “It takes a village, it really does.

“You wouldn’t think kids get excited about underwear and socks, but one little girl showed me her princess underwear. A lot of times they want to walk out in their new shoes. They’re very cute,” she said.

Diane Kabler, president of the Harlem Township Civic Association, nominated Ewald as an Everyday Hero. She said the township tries to assist everyone, and they all know Ewald.

“She’s always been involved in helping people,” Kabler said.

“She’s a kind soul.”

Kabler said Ewald’s efforts help support the civic association’s mission.

“During the year, she (Ewald) starts buying and looks for bargains. She’s a great shopper,” Kabler said.

During a community meeting, Kabler said, Ewald would show a long receipt of things she had purchased, and it came out to only $10.

“She’s a good buyer,” Kabler said. “She has sisters, and every year they go to Pennsylvania and shop at the outlet stores.

“We try to help people in the community who need it,” she said.

“They all know Diane. Everyone recognizes her generosity.” 

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SEMIFInalISt “There’s a measure of respect in there that I think everyone deserves. That keeps me going.”

Diane Ewald believes that every child should start the school year on equal footing.

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Finalist “i see it as so critical for kids to be exposed to service opportunities and community-building opportunities when they’re young.”

Brandy Jemczura organized Seeds of Caring to encourage families with young children to get involved in service and community projects.

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Planting the seed

Brandy Jemczura clintonville woman works to instill giving spirit in children

by Ken GoRdon the coluMbus Dispatch

Seven decades of age difference melted away with the warmth of the smiles on the faces of Betty Barch and the Williams sisters, as children mingled with the senior citizens at the summer carnival at the National Church Residences Center for Senior Health on the Northeast Side.

At one of the dozen or so activity stations, Stella Williams, 7, and Sadie Williams, 4, were bowling with plastic balls and pins alongside Barch, 77. The trio then moved on to use squirt guns to try to knock Ping-Pong balls off the top of 2-liter bottles.

The carnival was organized by Seeds of Caring, a nonprofit group founded two years ago by Clintonville resident Brandy Jemczura to encourage families with young children to get involved in service and community projects.

Hilliard resident Liz Williams, mother of Stella and Sadie, looked on in approval. This was the first Seeds of Caring event the family had attended.

“They’ve taken right to it, surprisingly so,” Williams said.

“They’re bringing her balls to go bowling and they’re talking to her and they want to involve her.

“I figured they’d be in a corner, shy somewhere.”

The point of the carnival was to help children feel more comfortable around senior citizens, and also to experience the satisfaction of brightening the older folks’ day.

It is part of Seeds of Caring’s larger goal of getting kids to view serving others as a lifelong value.

Photos by Rob HaRdin Dispatch Magazines

“I see it as so critical for kids to be exposed to service opportunities and community-building opportunities when they’re young,” Jemczura said, “so they don’t grow up and see service as something they have to do for a college application. It’s something they want to do because it’s been a part of their life and they have seen how it’s valued in their family.”

Seeds of Caring has clearly struck a chord, as evidenced by its rapid growth. In two years the group put on 130 events, ranging from packing lunches at soup kitchens to trash cleanup days to singalongs with the developmentally disabled, and totaled more than 6,000 hours of service.

Boo Krucky is an activities coordinator at Goodwill Columbus, which provides programming for adults with developmental disabilities. Seeds of Caring is a regular visitor to the group’s Grandview Heights center. “Every single thing we’ve done with them has just been phenomenal, a really high-quality experience for everyone involved,” Krucky said. Jemczura’s “heart is so much in the right place.”

Service has always been a part of Jemczura’s life. Growing up in Columbus, the Bishop Watterson graduate said her mother brought her children along when volunteering for the Salvation Army.

Jemczura met her future husband, Tomasz, while both attended Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia. The school requires that students participate in community service, Tomasz said. “One of the things I love about Brandy is SEPTEMBER 2018

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Brandy Jemczura Age: 36 What inspires her: A desire to keep volunteering after she had children, even though many organizations don’t allow kids 12 or younger to volunteer.

What keeps her engaged: The growth of the group and the examples she has seen in which children clearly have absorbed the lessons of community service. Jemczura tells the story of an event in which they talked to kids about acting on something they cared about. “After that, a little girl wrote a letter to the mayor saying there weren’t many playgrounds for kids who are disabled, and maybe Columbus should think more about that,” she said. “I feel really grateful and honored to be part of this.”

her dedication to doing good things for people,” he said. “And she’s so good with kids, she has an amazing talent to make a connection with kids.

“Back in college, all our friends thought Brandy would save the world one child at a time.”

They married in 2007. Jemczura worked as a middle-school teacher and in social work before the couple had children (Eliot, 7, Lucy, 5, and Maya, 1). The impetus for Seeds of Caring came from wanting to involve their children in volunteering.

“Volunteering was such an integral part of my life, and then when kids came along I thought, `I want it to be a central part of their lives,’ but there wasn’t opportunity out there,” Brandy said.

“So many opportunities exclude kids younger than 12, which I understand why.

A challenge she has overcome: Lack of sleep, as she began Seeds of Caring in 2016 with two children and gave birth to a third, daughter Maya, a year ago. Her husband, Tomasz, said, “We have no budget for childcare and she’s not willing to give up time with her kids, anyway.

So she is juggling being a wonderful mom, which she is, with running an amazing organization.”

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ABOVE: Brandy

Jemczura has fun with her 5-yearold daughter, Lucy, and Terry Smith at the Seeds of Caring Summer Carnival at the National Church Residences Center for Senior Health in July.

RIGHT: Jemczura gets help from some Tremont Elementary students in preparing 150 to 200 sack lunches for the Open Shelter.

“But kids have such big hearts and they have so much to give. I looked at my own children and I saw how they could make eyes with someone, a senior in the grocery store, and it just makes their whole day.

“And I thought, `There are so many families out there that want to do good things. . . . and they want to do them with their kids.

How do we make this happen?’”

Initially, Jemczura said the focus was on creating opportunities for parents of young children to volunteer together. The group’s mission statement has shifted slightly since then, she said, to emphasize making service an integral part of kids’ lives. The target age group is 2 to 12.

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“We don’t want it to be about, `Let’s go do this nice little thing one time,’” she said, “but rather, we want kids to think that they can change what they don’t like about their community.

“And I think they have to have those messages when they’re young, otherwise they might feel disempowered when they grow up.”

The group’s philosophy is summed up by T-shirts many volunteers wear to events. On the front it reads, “Kind is Cool,” and on the back is printed, “Transforming the Columbus community one kid at a time.”

Jemczura relies on a team of about 30 other parents who serve as event leaders. Parents can find events and sign up on the group’s website, seedsofcaring.org. The group currently puts on six to eight events a month.

True to her background in education, Jemczura makes sure each event includes a take-home element—typically, activities or discussion questions so that parents can reinforce the experience.

Jamie Merz, a Westerville mother of two, is an event leader and calls Jemczura, “a great leader.”

“She is so awesome and so organized,” Merz said. “We meet a couple times a year, all the event leaders, and she has a binder, and we go through everything, like what to say and how to structure on event.

“But then she also is super open to other people’s ideas. She’s very encouraging and she’s really into having a team atmosphere.”

Tomasz, who works in the banking industry, said he marvels at his wife’s dedication to Seeds of Caring.

“She works many nights,” he said. “The kids will go to sleep around 8 and she stays up to midnight or 1 a.m. four or five nights a week. It takes a toll on her.”

Jemczura said it’s worth it, though.

“Our volunteer leaders do so much and it’s such a team effort, so I can’t take sole credit,” she said. “But when I step back and look at everything that happens on a monthly basis, and the kids’ lives that have been impacted and the organizations that have benefited, I really feel grateful and honored to be part of this.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Hope in a time of crisis

Nikki Mccarthy Mother hoNors daughter’s MeMory through Music, art prograMs

By Andrew Atkins The Columbus DispaTCh

Photo By Fred squillAnte The Columbus DispaTCh

Watching kids splattering each other with paint and running around beneath the early afternoon sun, Nikki McCarthy holds back tears. It’s hard for her to visit Flying Horse Farms. But she finds joy in it, too. Here, she sees firsthand how Sam’s Fans, an organization she started in her daughter’s name, helps children.

“It makes her really excited that she’s out there doing something good from something horrible that happened,” said Patti Snyder, McCarthy’s mom.

The money Sam’s Fans raises goes toward funding music and art therapy programs for children. McCarthy, 45, isn’t hands-on with the therapy, but she makes it possible.

“The art and music therapy part is really personal and really intimate to each patient and family,” said McCarthy’s best friend, Mandi McGlone.

Sam’s Fans, which started in 2015, has funded a specialist for the last two years at Flying Horse Farms, a summer camp that provides experiences for children with serious illnesses at no cost. McCarthy said it was important for her to donate to a summer camp because Sam didn’t get to go.

“I don’t know who comes or what it looks like, but everyone’s happy,” she said. “As long as everyone’s happy, it works for me.”

The specialist implements camp-wide programming for music, dance, drama, theater and other activities for campers. Sam’s 26

Fans raises money through events like 5Ks and an annual live music and fashion show called Thread of Hope.

McCarthy grew up in Minerva Park, near Westerville. She lives in Upper Arlington and was a full-time mom before starting Sam’s Fans. Of her four children, only Sam had Fanconi anemia. The disease, according to the Fanconi Anemia Research Fund, is a DNA-repair disease that can lead to bone marrow failure, leukemia and solid tumors. Sometimes, infants have symptoms from birth. Sam didn’t. Instead, Sam got a cold she couldn’t shake. After a slew of doctor’s appointments, she was diagnosed when she was in first grade. She died when she was 11, on October 15, 2009.

“The day that Sam died, I remember walking into the hospital room, and Nikki said, ‘What am I going to do?’” McGlone said.

“And I said ‘I don’t know, but I’ll be right by your side and we’ll

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SEMIFInalISt “It makes her really excited that she’s out there doing something good from something horrible that happened.”

Nikki McCarthy lost her daughter to a rare form of anemia in 2009, inspiring her to start Sam’s Fans, which has funded music and art programs at Flying Horse Farms.

do it together.’ I didn’t know at the time what that meant, but I know now.”

gave them some sort of solace,” he said about the music programming. “Sometimes, the world can be crazy between hospital visits.”

McCarthy started Sam’s Fans, with McGlone’s help, as a nonprofit in 2015. McCarthy is the executive director and McGlone is the associate director.

McCarthy’s son Finn said he sees that Sam’s Fans has done more than help children.

Most donations to Sam’s Fans these days go toward funding music and art therapy programs. Funding recipients across the state include Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Dayton Children’s Hospital, and Nationwide Children’s Hospital here in Columbus, McGlone said.

Sam’s Fans also donated ukuleles to Flying Horse Farms. Kids can learn to play the instrument and use them in performances.

Rob Lyberg is a summer camp counselor at Flying Horse Farms. “It

“They all mean something,” Finn said about other charities. “But I think, to my mom, it’s different, because it’s just something that really helped her.”

McGlone sees McCarthy as a “fierce advocate” for her children, and someone who is always there when needed.

“She is one of the strongest people that I’ve ever met,” McGlone said. “She has been so inspiring to watch—just the way that she has turned her grief into this beautiful, beautiful thing that really honors Sam and what Sam loved.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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SEMIFInalISt “You have kids with disabilities looking up at an adult with a disability thinking, ‘He is in charge. He is somebody.’ ”

Rocky Grimes customizes vehicles to allow those with disabilities the opportunity to enjoy the thrills of motorsports.

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A LAbor of Love

Rocky GRimes “GeaRhead” chanGes lives with modified Go-kaRts

by Chloe skaar the coluMbus Dispatch

“Voila!”

Rocky Grimes stretches his arms out, gesturing to the view that greets his golf cart at the top of the hill. He grins as he takes in the valleys and sunshine visible from the pre-driver’s education course of his own design.

It’s his favorite part of his 50 acres in West Liberty, about 60 miles west of Columbus.

It’s his masterpiece.

It’s where Grimes, 46, lives with his family, working 12 hours a day, seven days a week on his “labor of love”—called Heart of Unlimited Boundaries—a physical therapy oasis that’s equal parts muscle training and adrenaline rush.

All of the go-karts and other small vehicles are customized by Grimes. They’re tailored for operation by people with various physical and cognitive disabilities. Some are powered by the headrest instead of a gas pedal, some can be steered with one arm and some have seats that can fully recline, allowing a person with muscular dystrophy to stretch their legs.

For a person with high-functioning autism, for instance, he created the pre-driver’s ed course, adjusting cone placements for length, width and skills. Some learn the basics of steering and accelerating, some learn to parallel park.

“If you engage the mind, the body will follow,” Grimes said.

“That’s the principle for it all.”

For a “gearhead” like Grimes, the mechanics are simply problem solving once the needs are understood. His 17 years of working with special needs individuals—as a horsemanship instructor and trail guide at Marmon Valley Farm in Zanesville and as a therapeutic riding instructor at Discovery Riders, near Bellefontaine—and his lifelong love of cars mean ideas come naturally.

This summer, Grimes hosted 38 people–ages 2 to 82–each week, with 18 on his waiting list. Some families came from Cincinnati

Photo by Tim Johnson Dispatch Magazines

and Akron every week to bring their children to Grimes’ nonprofit, which operates on the former campus of Adriel School.

The fields and forests provide a backdrop for outdoor trails where older kids learn to operate go-karts.

The 2- to 5-year-olds’ program is called Going Places. Inside the gym, a track with coloring, counting, bowling and puzzle stations outlines the basketball court. A drag racing course—complete with a smoke machine for burnouts—runs through the middle. Adults from Heart of Unlimited Boundaries work directly with the kids, running the remote control cars and staffing stations.

“You have kids with disabilities looking up at an adult with a disability thinking, ‘He is in charge. He is somebody,’ ” Grimes said.

“It’s not just little kids in cars.”

Grimes is the only one who works on the vehicles, and though his family helps maintain the courses, he needs resources.

“I’ve watched him in between sessions in the brutal summer, lie down on the concrete floor of the barn and pour water on himself to cool down,” said Pearl Cline, board president of Heart of Unlimited Boundaries. “When the next kid comes, he springs up.”

Grimes hopes to get the attention of a physical trainer who could develop doctor-approved routines.

“We want to have someone who can legitimize the science behind this,” Cline said. “We are looking at opportunities to serve some of the more limited.”

The money for operations comes from families, donations and the occasional sponsor. Last year, The Columbus Foundation donated $20,000. Without charging parents more, there isn’t room in the budget to hire anyone who can do what Grimes can.

And they don’t want to turn anyone away, since some parents are desperate for a program like this one.

“The most disabled people are the ones that are marginalized— people feel sorry for them, they are sitting in a chair doing nothing,” Cline said. “Rocky makes sure they are (active) every time.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Spirit StyliSt

Pat andrews Former Prison oFFicial raises women’s ProFiles —and sPirits—with dress For success Program

By Abbey MArshAll The Columbus DispaTCh

“You look like a superstar.”

Photo By Fred squillAnte The Columbus DispaTCh

Pat Andrews raved to Heidi Whitten as Whitten twirled in a new dress, excited about her new job.

Following her retirement in 2010, she continued to seek out ways to stay involved in the community. After hosting a French student for three months who piqued her interest in the world of fashion, she heard about Dress for Success.

Such a wardrobe would’ve cost Whitten hundreds of dollars. It was an expense she couldn’t otherwise afford without Dress for Success, a nonprofit that dresses women in difficult financial situations for job interviews and, ultimately, careers.

Since 2014, Andrews has worked twice a week, six hours a day without fail, said Molly Preston, suiting boutique manager at Dress for Success. Out of the 800 volunteers, Preston said Andrews stood out because of her dedication and patience.

But what had Whitten really beaming were the kind words of Andrews, her personal stylist.

“She really takes the time to listen to the clients,” Preston said.

“We get such good feedback about Pat. When they leave, they can’t stop talking about how amazing they feel.”

“I was having such a bad day until I came in here,” Whitten said as she adjusted her new blazer. “But [Andrews] is just so kind and knows exactly what works. You just leave feeling so ecstatic and vibrant.”

Making people look good and feel good is Andrews’ specialty as a volunteer for Dress for Success. She can’t stop smiling as she helps women that she’s never met before find the right outfit.

Andrews, 61, of Clintonville, worked in correctional facilities most of her life in a variety of roles, including as a social worker at the Columbus Correctional Facility and as a warden for eight years at the Franklin Pre-Release Center and the Ohio Reformatory for Women. In many ways, Andrews said, the backgrounds of the women she worked with during her career are similar to the women who come in for assistance at Dress for Success.

“I have an openness to and sensitivity of the ladies that come here,” she said. “In some ways, I can appreciate what they’ve gone through. It’s not because I walked in those shoes by any means, but I’ve seen the shoes they’ve walked in up close.”

Andrews always had a passion for working with women and for volunteering. She was a mentor for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Ohio, and mentored a girl from age 8 to 18, with whom she is still close.

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The smiles on those women’s faces are evident by the time they finish their two hours with Andrews, who meticulously selects outfits based on their specific style preferences.

When women are referred by a social agency and come to Dress For Success, they get one outfit for an interview. Once they land the job, they’re given five additional outfits, as well as shoes, accessories and toiletries.

Whitten called the organization a true blessing, with Andrews as an angel. “She’s kind and wonderful,” Whitten said of Andrews.

“She envisions it right on the hanger before it’s on my body. She really makes me feel like a superstar.”

After the two-hour styling session, Whitten and Andrews were laughing and joking as if they were old friends. Before she left with her clothes, shoes and jewelry in tow, Andrews gave Whitten a friendly embrace, wishing her well on her new retail job at LensCrafters in Reynoldsburg. If Whitten keeps her job for a year, she’ll get to come back and receive another session with five more outfits. But it wasn’t a question of if: Andrews has so much hope for the women she styles.

“It’s uplifting,” Andrews said. “Their confidence is totally raised.

I’m just happy to be a part of it.” 

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SEMIFInalISt “I have an openness to and sensitivity of the ladies that come here.”

Pat Andrews has a knack for making Dress for Success clients feel special.

SEPTEMBER 2018

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Dynamic Doc

Ryan SquieR

the deluge of overdoses Ryan Squier was treating as an emergency room physician motivated him to start Nix opiates to educate school-age youths about the dangers of drugs.

emeRgency depaRtment phySician ReacheS teenS to pRevent dRug abuSe

by Sheridan hendrix The columbus dispaTch

Photo by Fred Squillante The columbus dispaTch

Asking Ryan Squier to recall the first time he witnessed someone overdose on heroin in the emergency department is like asking him about the first time he saw someone have a heart attack. It happens so frequently now that he’s lost track.

When Squier, 34, pulls back the curtain at OhioHealth Grant Medical Center, just one of the six Central Ohio hospitals he works at as an emergency department physician, he doesn’t know what he’ll find.

Treating opioid addiction is common everywhere, from Downtown at Grant to suburban emergency facilities in Pickerington and Dublin, said Squier, a member of the American College of Emergency Physicians.

“You see it everywhere and that’s the thing,” Squier said. “We’re seeing it daily.”

Since 2016, Nix Opiates has reached more than 7,000 students in 17 different Ohio schools. Many of those students come from the Olentangy school district, where Squier lives with his wife, Amy, and their four young children.

Moved by what he saw in the hospitals, Squier helped create Nix Opiates, a campaign for teens aimed at ending opiate abuse through education. The program, run through Ohio ACEP, brings emergency department physicians like Squier into middle and high schools to share their firsthand experiences treating opioid addicts.

Whether he’s presenting to students, parents, teachers or administrators, Squier has a gift for making tough topics understandable for all audiences, said Karen Sedoti, former assistant principal at Olentangy Orange High School.

Physicians discuss the science behind addiction, statistics about the epidemic and personal stories straight from the emergency department, said Laura Tiberi, executive director of Ohio ACEP. “This is not just another ‘Just Say No’ campaign,” said Tiberi.

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The first time he presented to students, Sedoti said, “You could hear a pin drop.”

Anyone who sits through one of Squier’s presentations can feel his passion, said Amanda Sines, a lobbyist with Ohio ACEP.

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SEMIFInalISt Anyone who sits through one of Squier’s presentations can feel his passion.

“He has his day or night job, he’s working a shift and raising a family and he’s still doing this because he really cares,” Sines said. “I don’t know how he doesn’t get burnt out.”

Sedoti wondered the same thing. Squier once presented at a professional development day for Olentangy administrators after working at the ED until 3 a.m.

“He is a glaring example to our kids of what it means to give back,” Sedoti said. “It’s more than just work. He sees it as an opportunity.

He’s so willing to give of his talents and time and wisdom.”

Tiberi, who sometimes accompanies Squier to schools, said she notices one thing after every presentation: At least one person comes up and asks Squier for help.

“There is always somebody that comes up and says, ‘I need to talk to somebody,’ ” Tiberi said. “It’s so close to all of us. We’re all a step away. I think he always walks away feeling like we helped at least one person today.”

With so much discouraging news about the opioid epidemic, Squier said it can be hard some days to feel optimistic. But by dragging the debilitating effects of this epidemic into the light for the youth to see through Nix Opiates, he said he still has hope.

“I’ll say it 100 times, and if one person listens to me about their health choices, that’s still one percent,” Squier said. “I’ll say it ‘til I’m blue in the face because I want to make sure I’m helping people if I can save their life.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Finalist “i felt these were the people in the middle, people working hard to make ends meet, but they just can’t bridge the gap.”

Lancaster businessman Brad Hutchinson paid off every student’s outstanding lunch balance in all four Fairfield County school districts, among his many acts of charity.

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The paTron of fairfield CounTy

Brad HutcHinson PHilantHroPist lends HelPing Hand to anyone wHo needs one

by Holly ZacHaRiaH

Photos by Rob HaRdin

the coluMbus Dispatch

Dispatch Magazines

Brad Hutchinson was only half paying attention as he scrolled through his news feed when a story caught his eye: Some do-gooder somewhere had paid off the outstanding balances of all the cash-strapped families who couldn’t afford the bill for their children’s school lunches.

into showing up for the interview. Otherwise, he said he never would have agreed.

Well, Hutchinson thought, seems like an easy enough problem to fix. That’d be cool.

When a man who lives in downtown Lancaster needed a new three-wheeled bicycle to get around, Hutchinson bought him one. When a young girl needed a companion animal for her medical condition, he wrote a check for $5,000. When Shaw’s, a beloved local restaurant where he’d eaten dinner—usually prime rib—almost every Friday night, went bankrupt and closed without notice, Hutchinson and his own employees moved all the equipment out even as the building’s landlord was padlocking the doors. Then he spent five figures to cover the final paychecks for all of Shaw’s employees, and refunded all of the down payments that people had paid to secure the restaurant’s banquet room for their upcoming retirement parties or wedding receptions or birthday celebrations.

So he picked up the phone and made his offer. Turned out, the balances weren’t as high as Hutchinson expected at Lancaster schools – totaling only a few thousand dollars. So he didn’t stop there. When he was finished last year, he’d spent more than $14,000 to pay off every outstanding lunch balance in all four Fairfield County school districts.

“I’d had a good year,” said Hutchinson, whose two primary businesses of the many he owns are Company Wrench, a construction and demolition equipment company, and Taylor Rental, both headquartered in Fairfield County. “I felt these were the people in the middle, people working hard to make ends meet but they just can’t bridge the gap. It was an easy thing for me to do to help.”

He disliked the attention it brought, however. In fact, when a Columbus television station wanted to do a story about the donation, Hutchinson’s employees tricked him

This is how this self-made, successful businessman goes about his charity work: quietly, one meaningful, often life-changing donation at a time.

“If you have a family and you lose your paycheck, everyone goes hungry,” he said. “I certainly wasn’t going to stand by and see these people not get paid.”

The list of good deeds goes on and on, said Amanda Everett, executive director of the revitalization nonprofit, SEPTEMBER 2018

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Brad HutcHinson Age: 45 Inspiration: “I feel like if you have more than you need, you should share it. It’s the right thing to do.”

What keeps him engaged: “I like the stuff that everybody else says can’t be done, or be done easily.”

Brad Hutchinson (above) makes it a point to speak to every Company Wrench employee (left and opposite) during his morning walk-through.

A challenge he may have overcome: From a poor and troubled upbringing, with every card stacked against him, Hutchinson found love from the Miller family who took him in as a teenager and whom he still calls “Mom and Dad.” He used what he saw in his younger years as motivation to work hard and share his successes with those less fortunate.

Destination Downtown Lancaster. She’s had a front-row seat to Hutchinson’s many acts of kindness over the years, and points to the goosebumps on her arms as she recounts his good works: the veterans who needed new beds, the children who needed new toys, the dogs who needed new homes, the elderly who just needed a meal.

“People like Brad give me hope for humanity,” Everett said. “He isn’t going around town getting high fives. For every one thing 36

he does that makes the newspaper, there are dozens and dozens more that no one ever knows about.”

Hutchinson, 45, has made a lot of money; his companies are a $100 million enterprise. He shrugs when he says he could vacation anywhere in the world. He could drive BMWs and Porches. He could get Armani to custom make his suits. None of that is his style.

Instead, he wears faded blue jeans and scuffed boots and drives

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His biggest community project, though, is more a labor of love. And it is far from in the shadows. He is restoring the 16,000-square-foot, formerly condemned, historically significant Mithoff Hotel building in downtown Lancaster. For more than a decade, no one was willing to step up to help save the nearly 200-year-old building as it literally crumbled before the city’s eyes. a Toyota. Instead of vacations, he throws parties for his employees. He flies them and their families in from each of his Company Wrench locations in six other states and puts them up for a weekend of family fun. He pays his employees well and offers generous bonuses and retirement accounts. He uses Fridays as mentoring sessions at his own shop, preaching to younger employees about the value of saving early, spending wisely, staying out of trouble.

“The way he grew up, he just wants more for others,” said Shannon Heston, who has worked with him since he started Company Wrench in 1999.

From the beginning, nothing came easy for Hutchinson growing up in Lancaster. His mother was addicted to drugs, his father wasn’t any better off. Even today he has zero connection to any blood relative. Outside of shop class—he is a talented carpenter by trade—he hated school. His first real job was through a program for poor kids, painting fire hydrants and weed-whacking for the city.

Then a friend’s parents took him in as a teenager. He said he owes so much of what he is today to “Mom and Dad Miller.”

They underscored for him the things he’d always suspected, but had never really witnessed: Hard work can take you just about anywhere and, if you are fortunate enough, you must help wherever you can.

“If you are a floor sweeper, be the best damn floor sweeper you can be,” Hutchinson said. “And I’ll try to help you do that.”

Until Hutchinson, anyway.

He bought the building in 2015 for just $1. Nearly every day since then, he’s personally overseen its transformation and poured $4.1 million of his own money into it without a penny from any other investor. Why? “This is a legacy building. When I’m gone, if there’s one thing people will remember me for in this town, it’ll be this,” he said as he ran his hand along its still unfinished walls. “I wasn’t willing to let it die.”

Later this fall, the building will be reopened with one private apartment, office space and retail. The entryway will be a museum of sorts, a nod to the Mithoff’s rich heritage.

R. Michael Pettit, the city of Lancaster’s economic development director, said the community knows how lucky it is to have Hutchinson around. He rescues all sorts of buildings from the scrap heap. He bought an old bar and turned it into The Mill Event Center. He bought a sprawling old foundry that is now an indoor recycling center. He bought the run-down American Legion building and it could soon become a boutique hotel. And, most recently, when he decided the pole barn that a motorcycle group used as its clubhouse had become a nuisance to his own neighborhood, he bought that, too.

“Whether he’s helping people with a $100 check for groceries or spending $4 million to save a building,” Pettit said, “Brad Hutchinson is a humble philanthropist of the very best kind.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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SEMIFInalISt “I just like helping people, because I know a lot of the older people can’t do it all anymore,”

Robin Baker makes her slice of Clintonville a little nicer by extending random acts of kindness to her neighbors.

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Helping Hand across tHe street

Robin bakeR neighboRliness comes natuRally to clintonville woman

by KeViN PArKS ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Nancy Heller can recall returning to her Clintonville home after a 14-hour workday a few years ago to discover that someone had brought her trash can in. Right away, she knew who did it.

It was, in the grand scheme of things, no big deal, but for Heller at the end of a long, hard day, it was appreciated.

“It was one less thing I had to worry about,” she said.

Now a resident of Upper Arlington, Heller nominated former across-the-street neighbor Robin Baker as an Everyday Hero for her many gestures involving kindness and consideration for those living around her—not to mention taking care of that garbage can.

Photo by Lorrie CeCiL ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Pataskala area. After that marriage ended in divorce, Baker moved to south Clintonville and worked for a time at an insurance agency.

She’s retired now from a career that included school bus driver, medical supplies sales and running a tire store—the first woman, she stated with pride, to be hired as a manager for the particular nationwide tire chain.

“I loved that job,” Baker said. “That was kind of fun.”

Most recently, she managed a fitness center for women.

“Sometimes I call myself a Jill of all trades,” Baker said.

“I’d take it in just because it’s no big deal,” Baker said.

Baker wasn’t thrilled at the notion of being singled out for acts that, for her, are normal and natural.

“I was like, ‘Can I get out of this?’ ” Baker said.

“Robin’s the type of person who has always done good deeds, always in the background,” said Heller, who lived in Clintonville for 22 years. “She’s not the kind of person who’s going to win any big awards, do anything stupendous that gets a lot of recognition.

“They go unnoticed, but not by me and others who have been the recipients of those good deeds. She’s, without a doubt, the best neighbor I’ve ever had.”

“I just like helping people, because I know a lot of the older people can’t do it all anymore,” Baker said.

A native of Abington, Pennsylvania, Baker said she didn’t know what she wanted to do with her life after graduating from high school. After attending classes at a two-year college, she still was unsure. Several part-time jobs followed until Baker moved to Central Ohio with her first husband in the late 1970s when he was working for 84 Lumber. They initially settled in the

Baker and her second husband, Howard Baker, wed 32 years ago. He works in sales for Bob-Boyd Lincoln-Mercury. They have a 28-year-old son, William, who works at Safelite Auto. And Robin Baker works at making her neighbors happy, whether it’s picking up mail, taking in trash cans, helping a 92-year-old man who simply wasn’t able to make his bed anymore or collecting litter while out walking.

“Trash is my big thing,” she said.

Not long ago, an older woman who lives near Baker summoned her over to help investigate a mysterious beeping sound in her home. The woman was concerned it was something that might be a major problem and wanted to know if she should called the fire department.

Baker tracked the sound down to something completely innocuous, set the neighbor’s mind at ease and assured her, “Always call me first.”

“Whatever she can do to make someone’s life a little easier, she does it,” Heller said.

“I think it’s a rewarding thing to do, because you’re helping people, so how can that not be rewarding?” Baker asked.  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Caring for those in transition

MiMi RivaRd NuRse pRactitioNeR’s coMpassioN helps keep patieNts fRoM beiNg MaRgiNalized

By SARAH SOLE ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Photo By LORRiE CECiL ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Mimi Rivard became a nurse when she was 20 years old. It was at the height of the AIDS epidemic. Her entry into the health care industry was marked by sadness and loss, as individuals struggled not only with illness, but with community rejection and marginalization.

Robinson, a Columbus resident, has known Rivard for nearly 10 years through her work with the Equitas program Mozaic, which targets youth ages 13 to 29 who are people of color identifying as transgender, gender non-conforming and gender non-binary.

"It was an incredibly challenging time," she said.

"She has been one of the best helping hands that we have had within the community," Robinson said of Rivard.

Rivard, 51, sees parallels today in the trans community she serves in her role at Equitas Health. Both groups, she said, exhibit a strength, resourcefulness and a sense of community.

Rivard, a native of Waterbury, Connecticut, became a registered nurse in 1988 and a nurse practitioner in 1992. She has worked at Equitas since 2013, and provides medical care for those who desire medical transition. She helps patients with primary care, HIV care, hormone therapy and preventative therapy.

She said the medical care she provides helps people feel seen and recognized and helps them engage in health care in a way they hadn't had access to previously. Rivard said she's worked with members of the trans community through her HIV care over the last 30 years, but it has only been within the last two years that she has begun to focus on transition therapy.

In addition to their roles together at Equitas, Robinson said Rivard is also her personal health-care advocate and has helped give her the courage to begin working within the trans community as well, Robinson said.

Melissa Alexander, co-chair of TransOhio, said Rivard gives members of the community a great deal of respect and dignity.

Alexander said she has known Rivard for a few years, first meeting her through their respective roles at TransOhio and Equitas.

Rivard has delivered several presentations for TransOhio during its annual three-day symposium, including tips for health care providers about the proper way to run a health care practice for those identifying as trans or gender non-conforming. She’s also given presentations to members of the trans community about expectations for health care, and is the health care provider to Alexander’s partner, Paula.

"I feel like it's been a real gift," she said.

Now in her sixth decade, Rivard said she feels like she's experiencing somewhat of a second act in her life, one that makes her reflect on her time taking care of those with HIV and AIDS in the early years of her career. Those in the trans community face a similar sort of discrimination, she said.

"They're coming in carrying a lot of burden and a lot of suffering," she said, adding that they also face a tremendous amount of discrimination from the medical community.

Rivard has been one of the most supportive, empowering individuals in her field of medicine, encouraging her clients to reach their potential, said Mikayla Robinson.

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"She's a really good person," Alexander said of Rivard. "I think she's just wonderful. I wish we had more of her."

Rivard is modest about the praise she's received. She said she has mixed feelings about the work she does being characterized as heroic, she said, because the Hippocratic Oath says to do no harm. Members of the trans community, she said, shouldn't have to visit a special clinic with rainbow flags.

The real heroes, she said, are members of the trans community who persevere despite incredible disenfranchisement and abuse.

"I'm not the hero, I'm just a worker bee," Rivard said. 

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SEMIFInalISt The medical care she provides helps people engage in health care in a way they hadn’t had access to previously.

nurse practitioner Mimi Rivard provides care for a trans community in need of compassion.

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SEMIFInalISt Marian Stuckey founded the city’s Community, action, Resilience and Empowerment (CaRE) Coalition after seeing how trauma impacts neighborhoods.

“We pride ourselves on looking at trauma as not an individual basis, but on a community basis.”

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Responding to those in cRisis

MARIAN STUCKEY SoCIAl woRKER CREATES CoAlITIoN To hElp CoMMUNITIES hEAl by anDReW King ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

In 2015, Marian Stuckey and a group of social workers with Columbus Public Health were called to the scene of a crime in the Hilltop neighborhood of Columbus. At the time, Stuckey said she was “immersed” in her work, moving on from a position with the Franklin County Department of Job and Family Services that involved sanctioning of benefits. After her first job, she was still learning that “you’re not getting the full picture” when focused on “why people aren’t doing what we wanted them to do,” she said.

She was now interacting with people who were “severely mentally ill” and was seeing people on a more personal level than she had experienced before. “Those years were really fundamental to my career, in that I really got to see what it’s like,” she said.

“It really changed how I viewed the (social-work) profession.”

But when she and other social workers responded to the Hilltop scene in 2015, even she wasn’t prepared for what she encountered. A triple homicide had left the community devastated.

The task for Stuckey and her coworkers was to walk a two-block radius around the crime scene with Columbus Division of Police personnel to check in door-to-door with residents in the midst of the tragedy.

“There was a lot of grief, a lot of trauma,” she said. “It was a really tough time for the community, in addition to all the things they were facing on a regular basis. … That all came together and it was just overwhelming.”

From the trauma of that event, Columbus Public Health’s Community, Action, Resilience and Empowerment Coalition was born.

The coalition was founded in 2016 and led by Stuckey, now the director of neighborhood social work with Columbus Public Health. The goal was to provide the kind of inperson, individualized response to crises that Stuckey and others experienced in the aftermath of the West Side triple homicide. Stuckey, now 33 and a Delaware resident, calls that event the “backdrop” for the CARE Coalition, which has

Photo by Shane Flanigan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

served the Hilltop and Linden neighborhoods as pilot communities. The goal, she said, is to create “trauma-informed communities” that understand the effects of trauma and can recognize it when it happens.

“We pride ourselves on looking at trauma as not an individual basis, but on a community basis,” she said.

The coalition is still largely volunteer-based, with a paid staff of just four. That volunteer group has grown rapidly over the years, increasing from around 10 responders to the Hilltop murder to a network of around 300 today.

“It’s amazing how generous people are with their time,” Stuckey said.

But those who know her and her work say Stuckey deserves plenty of recognition for the group she’s put together. Emily Buster is a development officer with Ethiopian Tewahedo Social Services, a nonprofit organization that serves immigrants and refugees in Central Ohio. She served on the steering committee that created the CARE Coalition. She’s known Stuckey for years, and calls her “a very, very strong person who’s not afraid to get her hands dirty.”

She said her work in being inclusive and removing barriers for certain communities and groups of people has been admirable.

“She has just done so much,” Buster said. “She’s gone above and beyond, and she’s extremely passionate about bringing information about trauma-informed care to Columbus.”

Stuckey knows that her work is nowhere near complete, and she hopes to expand the coalition’s services to other underserved communities, she said.

“We know trauma happens all around the city,” she said. “We want to be in a place where we can address that and acknowledge that and look at every unique group and see how best to support them.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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The SoluTionS Man

Tom Fish, the former director of social work and family support services at ohio State University’s Nisonger Center has spent nearly 40 years helping people with developmental disabilities.

Tom Fish From book clubs To reTreaTs, advocaTe connecTs wiTh The developmenTally disabled

by OwEn DAughErty The Columbus DispaTCh

Photo by Eric AlbrEcht The Columbus DispaTCh

Kind, caring and dedicated? Yes. Patient? When it comes to waiting to get things done, not so much. Tom Fish doesn’t have time in his day for talking about solutions. He’s in the business of finding them himself.

The recently retired director of social work and family support services at Ohio State University’s Nisonger Center has spent his nearly 40-year career helping youth and young adults adapt to living with their developmental disabilities, trying some things that work and others that don’t.

“I try to go where I think people need help,” said Fish, 71. “I don’t have much patience for people who want to just talk about things.”

Yet when Fish is interacting with people who have developmental disabilities—the place where he says he is most comfortable—his patience appears limitless. He views those interactions as opportunities to help students grow and learn little lessons in social cues, where he says emotional intelligence is cultivated.

“All too often we think we can solve people’s problems or we can make them so-called ‘better,’” he said. “A lot of times it’s more a matter of helping them connect with people who will like them for who they are and figure out ways that they can be happy without being who we want them to be.”

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Through the years, Fish has conceived of numerous ways to help those with developmental disabilities interact in a more organic way—from sibling retreats to weekly book clubs— lamenting the programs that haven’t worked and celebrating the ones that have.

To be clear, the successes have far outweighed the failures, though Fish would never say as much. His colleague Jillian Ober, a program manager at the Nisonger Center, said the ideas devoped by Fish and the individuals those ideas have helped are too many to count.

“He’s always busy,” Ober said. “Always thinking, always creating.”

A social worker by trade, Fish said he was always drawn to working with underserved people, adding that he doesn’t have the patience to practice more traditional social worker roles such as couples counseling.

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SEMIFInalISt A social worker by trade, Fish said he was always drawn to working with underserved people.

Fish retired in June and plans to spend more time visiting his three adult children and being a grandpa to his two grandkids.

Yet Fish won’t be able to be truly retired for long. He is working on a book of short stories aimed at youth with developmental disabilities and will stay heavily involved in book club activities. For Fish, retirement is simply another opportunity to find a new avenue for his passion for helping people, particularly through literacy.

Recently, Fish has put much of his time and energy into weekly book clubs. The idea started 16 years ago when thinking about ways those with developmental disabilities could excel.

“The Special Olympics have been around for a long time. The hallmark of Special Olympics is that people are capable of being athletes like anyone else,” Fish said. “It dawned on me at the time that maybe there are other things that people can do that other people in our society do as well, and a book club came to mind.”

Since its inception, the book club concept has spread to 33 states and several countries. And Fish will stay heavily involved in expanding the program.

“The whole purpose is for people to come together and enjoy one another’s company around literacy, which oftentimes is not a pursuit that adults with disabilities have,” he said.

Fish says he has been drawn to people with developmental disabilities throughout his life, sparking his inevitable career choice. He works most frequently with people across the autism spectrum and those with Asperger’s Syndrome. To him, it’s the most rewarding work that exists.

“I consider it a privilege. They make me more happy than I make them,” he said. “Sometimes I would rather be with people with disabilities than people without. Not always, but probably more often than not.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Tireless crusader

BaBette FeiBel at 81, she Fights For parents and kids in Family recovery court

by Rita PRice the coluMbus Dispatch

The choice was inconvenient but not difficult. Babette Feibel could stay and tend to the 50-some people gathering at her home for a Fourth of July celebration, or she could excuse herself and rush to the aid of a recovering drug addict desperate to find an open pharmacy that would refill her treatment medication.

"I couldn't tell them what I was doing," Feibel said of her guests. "But I had to go with her."

Feibel's husband, four children and 13 grandchildren are accustomed to seeing their 81-year-old matriarch dash out the door to help someone with needs she considers paramount. An inclination toward aid and compassion has always come naturally to Feibel. Her response to fortune is duty.

"I'm just a person who has to have a purpose," she said.

"My life is rich. I don't want to play golf."

Feibel has long taken on some of the toughest volunteer jobs a community has to offer, and she doesn't intend to slow down now. After decades as a foster parent—she and her husband provided care and a loving home to more than 100 young children — Feibel has spent the past several years as a parent advocate in Franklin County Family Recovery Court.

The specialty docket serves drug- and alcohol-dependent mothers and fathers who have lost custody or are at risk 46

Photos by Rob HaRdin Dispatch Magazines

of losing custody of their children. Most of the parents have a history of unsuccessful attempts at sobriety; many have a co-existing mental or emotional disorder. Their pasts are pocked with criminal charges and evictions, homelessness and unemployment.

They're the hard cases, court Magistrate Susan House said. The program that seeks to ready them for reunification with their children is intense.

"Our participants don't have any family support anymore," House said. "They have burned all those bridges, or their family members use with them. Babette becomes their support."

She picks them up at home and drives them to all manner of appointments, all over the city. She advocates at health clinics, treatment centers, schools and government offices. She buys lunch. She shares laughter and tears. And when they come back to House to report on their progress, Feibel is in the courtroom, too.

House is in awe of her dedication. Others in Feibel's position—elderly, affluent and with decades of good deeds behind her—might sit back and rest, content to have done so much for so long. They might simply write checks to charity.

"I'm sure she could, and I'm sure she does," House said.

"But she just keeps giving in all these other ways. Babette is a gem."

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Finalist “i’m just a person who has to have a purpose.

My life is rich. i don’t want to play golf.”

Babette Feibel is a calming force for parents trying to regain custody of their children in the often charged environment of Franklin County’s Family Recovery Court.

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Recovery court personnel regularly sit down with social workers and others, including Feibel, for updates. They pore over urinetest results and employment interviews, apartment searches, utility bills and counseling reports.

BaBette FeiBel

Feibel doesn't coddle, but she fights alongside court participants. She tries to tend to snags and missteps before they blow up the case and, along with it, the chance for a child to know the love of a stable, healthy parent.

Age: 81 Neighborhood: Far East Side

"When we started this 15 or 16 years ago, we didn't have heroin," Domestic Relations and Juvenile Court Judge Dana Preisse said.

Inspiration: The many foster children that she and her family welcomed into their home. “There was so much satisfaction in having helped the kids.

It made me want to continue in other ways, too.”

At one point, with the court facing a shortage of providers willing to prescribe opioid-treatment medications such as Vivitrol and Suboxone, Feibel persuaded a reputable health center to step up, House said. Then she offered to drive people there.

discusses housing options and goals with Amanda Hopkins in Franklin County’s Family Recovery Court.

RIGHT: “Our participants don’t have any family support anymore . . .

Babette becomes their support,” said Domestic Relations and Juvenile Court Magistrate Susan House.

Feibel also used her connections to get one of Columbus' top defense attorneys to come to the aid of recovery-court participants. House can't help but laugh a little at the one-sided conversation. "Look. My girl is working hard and doing a good job, but she's got this case...''

What keeps her engaged: The support of her family and the journeys of the parents she now works with in Franklin County Family Recovery Court, who are trying to end their dependence on drugs and reunite with their children.

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ABOVE: Babette Feibel

Amanda Hopkins and Austin Maselli, recovery-court participants who were working this summer to regain custody of their four children, said Feibel helps people believe in themselves.

"She's been there every step of the way," said Hopkins, 30.

Maselli, 24, said Feibel seems to know when to deliver a lecture, when to offer encouragement, and when to step back. "She had faith in us."

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I thought I was going to die at her funeral," she said. "It was so devastating. She had two little boys."

Part of Feibel's passion for volunteerism likely was picked up at the dinner table, her husband said, as she grew up in a family heavily involved in both the Jewish and wider Columbus communities. The rest is a matter of her irrepressible personality.

"Whether it's being a wife or a mother or a grandmother or a community person, it's always all in," said Jim Feibel, 85. "Her attitude is, 'We're only here for a short time, and you might as well make the most of it.' '' She wasn't quite 3 years old and he was just 6 the first time he saw her, playing in a sandbox with her twin sister. They live on the Far East Side and recently celebrated 62 years of marriage.

"We're a team," Mrs. Feibel said.

Mr. Feibel, an attorney, has long donated his services in the community. He helped the recovery court establish a charitable organization so that it could collect donations to benefit participants and their children, and he continues to prepare the annual tax return. Thanks to his wife, Mr. Feibel also has appeared in court to assist recovery-court participants with eviction cases.

He was unsurprised when Mrs. Feibel asked everyone in their family to skip the gifts for her 80th birthday and instead make a contribution to Family Recovery Court. "She's impulsive in a good way," Mr. Feibel said.

Mrs. Feibel has served on the boards of numerous organizations over the years and is grateful for the recognition and awards she's received, even if she's not one to list them. She's more apt to talk about children, about justice and about the difference one caring and determined person can make.

Feibel, a former trustee for the Franklin County Children Services board, smiled as she talked about the Hilltop couple's journey. Hopkins is a wonderful person, she said. "She just needs to keep it glued together to get those kids back."

She's still proud that she pushed back, years ago, against the devastating diagnosis given to one of her young foster children.

"They thought he was brain-damaged and deaf when he came to me," she said. "And I knew he wasn't."

The hard work of rebuilding lives rarely discourages Feibel, who even managed to shrug it off when a distraught court participant punched her as they drove to an appointment. "I wasn't scared," she said.

He made great strides, as did so many of her foster babies. Mrs. Feibel won't stop believing in the potential of the parents in recovery court, either.

Only once has the pain become so great that Feibel wasn't sure she wanted to continue. "I had one die of a heroin overdose, and

"I'm 81 years old, and this energizes me," she said. "My philosophy in life is, I'm going to die with my boots on." ďƒŞ SEPTEMBER 2018

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The soul of The hispanic communiTy

AlmA SAntoS Childhood need SpArkS CompASSion by alan FROMan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Photo by Shane Flanigan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Each day, when Alma Santos welcomes families to Our Lady of Guadalupe Center on Columbus’ West Side, she sees more than just clients looking for a little assistance from the food pantry there. She sees a reflection of herself and her own family.

“I see my mom in the parents, and I can see myself as a little girl in the children,” said Santos, the center’s coordinator.

That’s because Santos was once in their position—part of a family that was struggling and homeless and in need of a helping hand.

Our Lady of Guadalupe Center, a program of Catholic Social Services, serves approximately 3,000 people in the Hispanic community in Franklin, Delaware, Fairfield and Madison counties.

The center provided nearly 100,000 meals to families in 2017.

In May 2017, Our Lady of Guadalupe moved to a new building that provides three times the space and more services.

“The food is what brings them in, because they need food,” Santos said. “We try to provide them with services that will nourish their spirit.”

The services include case management, job-search assistance, nutrition and English classes, health screenings, legal aid and linking clients to appropriate community social service organizations.

“There are more than 400 food pantries in Central Ohio, and we are one of the few that have staff members who can speak Spanish,” Santos said. “We are the only food pantry in our area that primarily serves the Hispanic population.”

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Santos, 38, grew up in a migrant family that split time between Mexico and Southern California working in the fields. After the family moved permanently to California, Santos’ parents divorced when she was 10 years old. She, her mother, Catalina, and her two siblings, Imelda and Emmanuel, ended up homeless, sleeping at shelters when they could and on benches in Washington Park in Escondido when necessary.

She didn’t tell anyone about her background, even when she joined Our Lady of Guadalupe in 2010 after working as a volunteer with Catholic Social Services. “I never said anything about that because it was too embarrassing, at least to me,” Santos said. “I thought, ‘Who would be proud to be a homeless person?’ ” Last year, Santos traveled to California with her children and visited the park. “They couldn’t understand why I was getting so

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SEMIFInalISt “The food is what brings them in, because they need food. We try to provide them with services that will nourish their spirit.”

Alma Santos had increased the reach of the Our lady of Guadalupe Center’s food pantry, serving Columbus’ West Side Hispanic community.

emotional,” she said. “I was feeling sick to my stomach because I could hear myself as a child crying and hear my mother crying and hear her praying.”

It was then that she finally felt free to tell her children her full life story.

out of her van in 1999.

“I had moved to Columbus when I was 18, and I was so happy when I could bring the rest of my family here,” Santos said. “My mother had always told us, when we were visiting soup kitchens to get meals and staying at shelters, that she only considered it a loan and that someday she would find a way to pay it back.”

“It was closure for me,” she said.

She paid it back by paying it forward.

Santos has an innate spirit of compassion and drive to help others, said Rachel Lustig, CEO of Catholic Social Services. “ ‘Alma’ in Spanish means ‘soul,’ and that is such an appropriate name for her,” she said. “Because Alma truly is the soul and spirit of Our Lady of Guadalupe and she is the soul and spirit of the Hispanic community.”

“We were back on our feet, and my Mom started using all the money she earned from working to go to the grocery store, buy food and deliver it in person to families who were in need in our community,” Santos said.

Santos said the heart and inspiration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is her mother, who started operating the food pantry

“My mother never forgot about her ‘deuda’—her debt—that she needed to pay.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Comfort, awareness for CanCer patients

AnAmArie rAyburn Powell womAn tArgets ovAriAn cAncer with “extreme dedicAtion”

by KelleY YOUMan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Do you know the signs and symptoms of ovarian cancer?

If you answered “no,” then you haven’t met Anamarie Rayburn.

Rayburn, 60, of Powell has made it “a labor of love” to educate and empower women facing the daunting battle with ovarian cancer. She is president of the Patricia A. DiNunzio Ovarian Cancer Fund, named for her sister, who died in 2014 after a five-year struggle with ovarian cancer. Pat DiNunzio started the fund in 2010, a few years before her death at 52.

For her 50th birthday, Rayburn and supporters organized a fashion show as a fundraiser for her “fashionista” sister. Now in its eighth year, Runway to Awearness is held each September, coinciding with Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. It has raised more than $220,000 for women with gynecological cancers, and continues to grow.

“We knew that she was going to die from ovarian cancer, so she said, ‘I want to leave a legacy.’ That’s truly what Pat really wanted—she always wanted people to have an experience,” Rayburn said.

The fund distributes “comfort bags” designed by DiNunzio herself while she was undergoing treatment.

Photo by Shane Flanigan ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

“We’ve just always made it our mission for women to know the signs and symptoms of ovarian cancer. I want them to know that we are in this fight with them and they are not alone,” Rayburn said. “You don’t know when it’s going to be someone you know that’s battling this disease. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t talk about it.”

The fund has purchased blanket warmers, TVs and furniture for patients at both Ohio State University’s James Cancer Hospital and the OhioHealth Hospice Kobacker House.

In 2015, a $3,000 scholarship was launched for Ohio State University nurses pursuing degree advancement in cancer care.

“You’ve got to take care of the people who are taking care of the patients,” Rayburn said.

Last year, Room 25 at the OhioHealth Hospice Kobacker House was dedicated in honor of DiNunzio and the fund she started.

“I think she would be very pleased that we took the little seed of her concept and grew it into a beautiful flower,” Rayburn said.

Rayburn was nominated as an Everyday Hero by her sister-inlaw, Julianne DiNunzio, who said Rayburn puts in “countless hours just to make this awful experience a little more pleasant.”

“It has a water bottle, patient information packets, hard candy to help with nausea, hand sanitizer so you can keep your hands clean, ChapStick because your lips get chapped, and other things like an eye shield so you can actually rest,” Rayburn said.

“The fund does so much good for the many women suffering from ovarian cancer,” she said. “When Anamarie found out she was nominated as an Everyday Hero, she was happy for the fund—not for herself, but for the fund. She knows it’s another way to get the word out there and bring more attention to the fund and hopefully be able to help more people.”

Ovarian cancer’s early common symptoms—abdominal bloating, loss of appetite, back pain and changes in menstruation— often are mistaken for something else. When her sister was diagnosed, Rayburn said she was dismayed at the lack of patient education available.

Rayburn said she’s guided by a simple principle: “This patient is in the fight for their life; what can I do differently? How can I make it better? How do I reach out to more people?” Rayburn said. “I just really have a passion to try and make things right for the next patient.” 

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SEMIFInalISt “You don’t know when it’s going to be someone you know that’s battling this disease.”

Anamarie Rayburn holds a photo of her sister, Patricia Dinunzio, who died in 2014 from ovarian cancer. Rayburn helps raise money for ovarian cancer patients and research through the Patricia a.

Dinunzio Ovarian Cancer Fund.

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SEMIFInalISt “Unless you’ve experienced a fire or flooding, you don’t realize what a catastrophic thing that is to people’s lives.”

William Pohl, coordinator of the Sound the alarm program at the american Red Cross of East & South Central Ohio, has helped place more than 1,000 smoke detectors in homes in Fairfield and Hocking counties.

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Sounding the AlArm

Bill Pohl Red CRoss volunteeR sPeaRheads fiRe-safety PRogRam

by Julanne HoHbacH coluMbus parent

Photo by Rob HaRdin Dispatch Magazines

A desire to give back to his community in retirement led Bill Pohl to the American Red Cross of East & South Central Ohio, where he leads a lifesaving mission to install smoke detectors in homes across Fairfield and Hocking counties. The Sound the Alarm initiative has placed more than 1,000 devices in some of the area’s most vulnerable households in the last three years.

Fairfield and Hocking counties, Pohl said, “I would say we’ve installed over 1,000 smoke alarms.”

Pohl, a Rushville resident, has been a Red Cross volunteer since 2011, working on local disaster relief, serving as a Sound the Alarm coordinator and sitting on local and regional boards.

“He is the Sound the Alarm campaign,” said Rod Cook, executive director of the East & South Central Ohio chapter, who tapped Pohl to lead the initiative. “He believes in it and that helps him to sell it to other organizations and to the clients themselves.”

Pohl organizes door-to-door canvasses in fire-prone areas, working with church groups, the United Way and fire departments. He also makes presentations to organizations such as Meals on Wheels and home-health-care agencies through his role as a Red Cross community volunteer leader.

Pohl, 70, runs the program with an analytical flair that befits his background. A Milwaukee native who grew up in Chicago, he holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University. The U.S. Navy veteran worked in technical, sales and management posts in the nuclear power industry, at Spectra Physics Corp. in California and Dayton (where he moved in 1982), and with Princeton Delivery Systems in Canal Winchester, from which he retired in 2010.

He wanted to continue using those skills, so he stopped by the Red Cross. “I volunteered for a number of years to be on call for local fires and disasters,” Pohl said. “It’s rewarding and it’s shocking, because unless you’ve experienced yourself a fire or flooding, you don’t realize what a catastrophic thing that is to people’s lives.” He parlayed that experience at the national level, helping to run a Red Cross shelter outside White Plains, New York, after Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Pohl, who’s also a community watch volunteer with the Fairfield County Sheriff’s Office, started working on Sound the Alarm about three years ago. The campaign has installed more than 1.4 million smoke detectors nationwide since 2014. The program— free to residents—is funded by donors and corporate partners.

Since the local chapter helped pilot the program, “We’ve averaged probably about 1,200 alarms per year,” Cook said. In

It’s making a difference—and saving lives. “In the Columbus area, we’ve had a couple of documented saves,” Cook said, where a detector has helped someone escape a fire.

At a recent canvass in the Lancaster Campground area, 20 volunteers visited more than 230 residences in six hours. “We installed 61 smoke alarms [and] did education in each home that we visited,” Pohl said. Even if residents say they have a smoke detector, the team aims to provide fire-safety information and verify whether the equipment is functional. Residents who aren’t home get a door hanger and can call to set up a later visit. “I’ve installed … almost 300 through private appointments,” Pohl said.

He also has forged memorandums of understanding with four local fire departments and an HVAC company to install detectors for the Red Cross. “You’d be amazed at how many people either don’t have them or … people don’t know you’re supposed to replace them after 10 years,” said Capt. KJ Watts, EMS captain with the Lancaster Fire Department.

“He’s really an innovator,” said Joyce Guenther, a Red Cross board member. “He’s always thinking about a different way to get more people involved.”

“It’s pretty easy to retire and just continue to do the things that you’re comfortable with,” Pohl said. “I think there was probably some desire to always do things that took me a little bit out of my comfort zone, out of what I was used to doing. And you’re doing it knowing you’re doing it for the right reasons with a great organization, and it just doesn’t get any better than that.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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Making a difference one Meal at a tiMe

Amber Hudson WomAn “creAtes fAmily” WHile Helping veterAns

By NATE ELLIS ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

Photo By ShANE FLANIgAN ThisWeek CommuniTy neWs

After serving her country, then falling on hard times, a mother and Navy veteran founded a food pantry for veterans that’s grown into a burgeoning nonprofit organization. She hopes her venture will someday expand nationwide.

are locations at the U.S. Air National Guard section of Rickenbacker Military Base on the South Side of Columbus and at the Defense Supply Center Columbus in Whitehall, the latter of which opened July 19.

A veteran of the U.S. Navy Reserves, 50-year-old Amber Hudson of Columbus knows all too well the struggles military veterans, their families and widows and widowers can face. Following a divorce and trying to raise three young boys, she found herself struggling to put food on the table. She turned to a local soup kitchen for help. But not a handout. She and her sons helped with the preparation and cleanup every Wednesday.

M.A.S.H. rents box trucks each month to take mobile produce markets throughout Franklin County and to American Legion posts and veterans service organizations in Pickaway, Delaware and Union counties.

“The reason we did that was because I needed to feed them and I depended on that soup kitchen to be there,” Hudson said.

By 2015, Hudson was starting to get back on her feet and working at the Columbus Veterans Administration. There, she heard many other stories about veterans in need.

She decided to found the Military and Service Heroes (M.A.S.H) Pantry and Resource Center, a nonprofit that provides food, toiletries, clothing and hygiene products, as well as emotional and physical support and resources to military personnel and veterans throughout the Columbus metropolitan area.

“I didn’t have any money to even send the nonprofit application in,” Hudson said. “So I pawned my Jeep Wrangler and jewelry, and here we are. And I’d do it again and again. We’re making a difference a meal at a time, a handshake at a time, just sitting down sharing a cup of coffee with a veteran, listening to what they need.”

Since establishing the M.A.S.H. Pantry and Resource Center in May 2015, the organization has expanded and continues to grow.

Its main center is at 2731 Columbus St. in Grove City. There also 56

“Amber has a lot of compassion because she’s lived it,” said Elaine Fowler, M.A.S.H. vice president. “She gives veterans value with no strings attached.”

Fowler said Hudson “gives so much of herself that it makes a difference in people’s lives.”

“You see the smiles on their faces,” Fowler said. “A lot of them are lonely people, and bringing them together, that’s what Amber does. There’s nothing demeaning about it. It’s family. Amber creates family.”

Through ongoing trial and error, M.A.S.H. and its volunteers continue to build momentum. “We need more sponsors, but it’s happening,” Fowler said. “People are starting to come to us.”

By the end of summer, another center is expected to open in Delaware to serve veterans and their families from Delaware County and surrounding areas. Hudson said she hopes eventually to expand throughout Ohio and even nationally.

“We serve veterans, not based on income,” she said. “We’re just honored to serve every veteran that comes through the door.

We don’t even talk about income.

“I want the veterans to be able to depend on us. We’re not giving a handout. We’re giving a hand up. We’re here to help them.” 

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SEMIFInalISt “She gives veterans value with no strings attached.”

Amber Hudson is president of the M.a.S.H. Pantry and Resource Center in Grove City, serving military personnel and veterans.

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Finalist “i just can’t stand to see their pain.”

A few times each week, Sister Nadine Buchanan loads up her car with meals and other supplies and heads to the West Side to provide help and a friendly face to those living on the streets.

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“They’re hungry for hope.”

SiSter NadiNe BuchaNaN For womeN trapped iN a cycle oF proStitutioN, addictioN aNd exploitatioN, domiNicaN NuN oFFerS mealS, FrieNdShip aNd SometimeS a path to a Better liFe.

by SuzAnne GoldSmitH coluMbus Monthly

On a scorching Friday in June, Sister Nadine Buchanan paid a visit to a man named Tony who was living on the porch of an abandoned house on Columbus’ West Side.

Tony has a seizure disorder, she explained, and every few days she brings him adult diapers, wet wipes and a new freezer pack for the cooler where he keeps his food.

As soon as Buchanan pulled up to the curb in front of Tony’s makeshift residence, a woman jumped out of a car across the street and ran over. Skinny and jittery, she shifted her weight nervously from foot to foot as Buchanan rolled down the window and handed her a bulging reusable grocery bag.

“I love you,” said the nun as the woman scurried away with her bag, which contained sandwiches, cold water, juice, snacks, feminine supplies, socks, shampoo and other essentials.

“I love you too, honey!” the woman called back over her shoulder.

It wasn’t an unusual occurrence for Buchanan, who is out every week in her gray Toyota sedan, driving the streets of Franklinton and looking for people to help.

“The ladies”—her name for the women who walk the streets there, selling sex, usually to pay for drugs or a place to sleep—sometimes spot her before she sees them. They know her car. They know her face. They know her kindness.

Photos by Rob HARdin Dispatch Magazines

Nine years ago, Buchanan, a member of the Dominican Sisters of Peace, was looking for a new ministry. Recently retired from a career as a teacher and hospital chaplain, she was finally getting back on her feet after a decade marred by seven back surgeries. Buchanan began volunteering at CATCH Court (Changing Actions to Change Habits), a specialized docket for women who have pleaded guilty to soliciting and want to access drug treatment and other assistance to turn their lives around. She also helped at Doma (now Freedom a la Cart), a catering company that provides training and work for former prostitutes. There, she met April Thacker, a case manager who is herself a former addict and prostitute.

Buchanan joined Thacker in delivering holiday meals to women who were still on the streets, and found herself drawn to do more. Eventually, Buchanan began visiting Franklinton on her own, looking for ways to help those stuck in a life of addiction, exploitation and selling sex. “I just can’t stand to see their pain,” she says. “I love them.”

Two or three times a week, she packs up her car with lunches and useful items and heads to Sullivant Avenue.

The blighted neighborhood that she has adopted, dotted with boarded-up houses, is an eight-minute drive and a world away from the peaceful, pastoral motherhouse of the Dominican Sisters of Peace where she lives, just off Sunbury Road near Ohio Dominican University. Sometimes, after a visit, she says, “I feel like I’ve been to hell and back.”

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NadiNe BuchaNaN Age: 67 Who inspires her: “My women survivors.”

What keeps her engaged: “The need, the pain and the suffering. I try to relieve it and bring hope and trust to the ladies.”

Challenges she has overcome: “Going out into the unknown of what’s happening on the streets, because I never know what I’m going to be walking into, and the discouragement I sometimes feel—like when I hear that one of the women has died of an overdose.”

ABOVE: Sister Nadine Buchanan bags up lunches and loads her car for another trip to help those in need on the West Side.

“Honey, can I give you a lunch?” she calls, rolling down her window and slowing alongside any woman walking alone who looks like she’s got nowhere to go.

Buchanan’s hope is not only to feed these women physically and emotionally, but to befriend them so that one day, during an encounter, a woman will say to her, “help me get out of here.”

Sometimes, the women get into her car to talk. They share their stories, which often include opiate addiction and physical abuse at the hands of pimps, drug dealers and clients—as well as histories of childhood abuse and neglect. “There’s a lot of shame and a lot of guilt,” she says. “They think they’re not worth anything.”

It takes time, but it happens. She often drives women who ask for help to shelters and treatment centers, or, when they are sick or injured, to the hospital. She once bought a woman a plane ticket to return home to Florida, and drove her to the airport.

“They’re hungry for hope, hungry for anybody that says, ‘You’re good! You are good.’”

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Columbus Police detective Aaron Dennis of the Central Ohio Task Force on Human Trafficking says Buchanan plays a critical role in his unit’s fight against sex trafficking because of the trust she has gained among the women. His task force wants

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OPPOSITE: Buchanan and the nuns at the Dominican Sisters of Peace assemble feminine hygiene packages for women in need.

LEFT: A man identified

only as Anthony gives Buchanan a hug after she brought him some needed supplies and tennis balls to his dog, Silly.

to help them, but they often don’t trust the police. “When they say, ‘Today’s the day I’m going to get out of this,’ how else would they do it? Flag down a cruiser?

Judge Paul Herbert, who founded the court in 2009, calls her an “MVP.” He describes how she picked up one client in Cleveland and took her to a treatment center in Waverly, an hour south of Columbus.

“Imagine if we didn’t have her out there,” he says.

Buchanan grew up in Zanesville, the daughter of a steel mill worker. When she was in the fifth grade, her father had a heart attack and stroke and could no longer work. As soon as she was old enough, Nadine began working to help her family, first as a babysitter and then by taking in laundry and ironing.

“I would go down to the eighth ward looking for work,” she says, “and I can remember men trying to get me in their car.” It was a tough childhood, she says, but “I wouldn’t change it for anything because it tenderized my heart to what these people go through.”

It’s that tender heart that makes her so effective, says Keturah DeChristopher, a coordinator at the CATCH Court. “She’s very approachable and very joyful. She has that light. I think that’s important for people that are often very scared and mistrusting of others.”

Buchanan is also there to help when women want to make a change following an arrest. She is the first person the CATCH court calls to meet a woman joining the program at the jail and drive her to a residential treatment center.

“It was an all-day event. Putting the miles on her car, putting the gas in, and then loving on somebody in an amazing way,” he says. “That’s just one representative story. Everything we need, that’s what we ask her to do.”

Buchanan also looks for other ways to help. People often give her contributions, and what she doesn’t spend for meals and supplies she pours into related projects. She recently secured a $4,000 grant to help with renovations at a Franklinton respite house for women living on the streets. She recruited staff from Mt. Carmel Hospital to host a medical day for the women, with free pregnancy and STD tests and other help.

And earlier this summer, she hosted a sleepover party at Ohio Dominican (which was founded by the Dominican sisters) for 19 women in various stages of recovery from “the life.”

Thacker, now eight years sober and independent, says she wishes she’d met Buchanan when she was turning tricks for dope money.

“I always tell Sister I wish she had been there to pick me up,” says Thacker. “Just to be in her presence, I get this wonderful feeling of peace.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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SEMIFInalISt “It was the right people at the right time, and I couldn’t be more thankful.”

an escape from the pressures of law school led Jennifer Hansen to a new purpose, Dreams on Horseback, which provides vocational skills and therapeutic assistance through contact with horses at her Blacklick farm.

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Healing WitH Horses

Jennifer Hansen Blacklick nonprofit Dreams on HorseBack originateD as a stuDent’s one-Horse sHow

by LiLLian van Wyngaarden columbus monthly

Law school may seem like a strange foundation upon which to build a nonprofit focused on horses. But in those stressful days of studying and preparing for the bar exam, Jennifer Hansen found another passion.

Hansen found relief in horses—specifically, her horse, Daisy. As an outlet from school, Hansen volunteered to bring Daisy to church events so that children could interact with her. Quickly, the requests multiplied, and Hansen and Daisy began visiting more churches and schools as well. She especially enjoyed sharing Daisy with inner-city youth who might never have encountered a horse up close before. There was a fulfillment in sharing that experience and before long, Hansen realized this is how she wanted to spend her days.

In 2002, Hansen and her husband bought a barn in Blacklick.

She could now cut out the travel part of the experience and bring the youth to the horses, and Dreams on Horseback was born. The visits from the children turned into what is now the center’s vocational program that teaches inner-city students workplace skills such as communicating with a supervisor or handling conflict through care of horses.

Dreams on Horseback offers a variety of programs for just about anyone in the community from ages 3 to 93. The center has grown from its original vocational emphasis to become a premier therapeutic center accredited by the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship International, or PATH, offering therapeutic riding lessons, Alzheimer’s sensory programs, military connections and equine-assisted learning.

The growth of the center has brought the comfort of horses to more lives than Hansen could have expected, but she says the growth could not have happened without the passion from the surrounding community.

Photo by Tim Johnson dispatch magazines

“It truly has been the community that has brought this change,” says Hansen, 50. “Each program has followed a path that was not carved by my hand. It was carved by all the people that have come to this farm that love horses, love helping others and have a passion or a need. It was the right people at the right time, and I couldn’t be more thankful.”

Heidi Clous, Dreams on Horseback’s assistant development director, first became involved with the organization in 2008 when her daughter Ava was diagnosed with classic nonverbal autism. Heidi instantly began traditional therapy programs for Ava but felt something missing. Eventually she discovered the therapy riding lessons offered by Dreams on Horseback. The connection between Ava and the horses became clear when Ava spoke her first word while atop a therapy horse at the age of 4.

“It was revolutionary,” says Heidi. “She was speaking to the horse, not to me, and it was this connection she had with the horses that gives me so much hope. I didn’t know what her future would be, but it’s helped her, me and the whole family.”

Ava, now 11, competes on the organization’s Special Olympics equestrian team and rides weekly.

Dreams on Horseback supports more than 95 students each week in its various programs and has a volunteer base of more than 150 students and 24 part-time staff members. It’s grown far beyond the original one-horse shows Hansen and Daisy put on 16 years ago.

“Was this the life I expected when I went to law school? Absolutely not,” Hansen said. “I was looking at having a high-end job, traveling the world. But could I ever ask for anything more fulfilling? Absolutely not.”  SEPTEMBER 2018

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8/22/18 4:21 PM

Tough Love

Scott VanDerKarr Former JuDge helpS communitieS create Drug courtS to help aDDictS

by Kevin stAnKiewiCz the columbus dispatch

The teddy bear Scott VanDerKarr carries in his briefcase tells the story of the opioid epidemic and one life saved. It also helps explain why VanDerKarr stepped down as a Franklin County Municipal Court judge in 2016.

The light-brown bear with a golden ribbon belonged to the son of a woman enrolled in VanDerKarr’s drug-court program. But the boy, who was about 4 years old, wanted VanDerKarr to have it.

“He says you gave him back his mother,” VanDerKarr recalls the mother telling him.

He pauses for a moment.

“Usually the hair on my arms stands up when I tell it,” he said.

“That’s what this is all about.”

VanDerKarr, 61, of Dublin, has been directly involved in the fight against the opioid epidemic since 2009, when he started overseeing Franklin County’s drug court. He left the bench in 2016 after 20 years because he wanted to help other cities and counties establish their own drug courts. He thought he could help more people that way.

Drug courts help addicts stay out of prison by offering treatment programs and other services while holding offenders accountable.

A 1982 graduate of Capital University Law School who worked in the Franklin County Prosecutor’s office for 13 years before becoming a judge, VanDerKarr recently started Lives Back, a nonprofit that helps communities across the state create drug courts. With the assistance of Lives Back, Vinton County this fall will launch three drug courts.

VanDerKarr also works as a private consultant with companies 64

Photo by AdAm CAirns the columbus dispatch

and organizations on issues related to opioids. He helped Whitehall establish its drug court, and he’ll serve as its magistrate.

Had Charlie Stewart not entered drug court in 2012 and gotten clean, he said he’s not sure where he’d be.

“I know if you continue to stay in active addiction, there’s not many good outcomes,” said Stewart, 26, who now works at Mount Carmel Hospital, helping connect addicts with treatment and recovery resources. “Drug court and Scott were instrumental in me starting my recovery process.”

VanDerKarr said what makes drug courts an effective way to combat the crisis is “treatment with accountability.” The weight of the judicial system, he said, helps ensure participants attend detox, receive intensive outpatient treatment, and get mentalhealth counseling. There’s also frequent drug testing.

“Without that accountability, I couldn’t tell you whether I’d have been able to get clean,” Stewart said.

Among people Stewart knows locally in the recovery community or who work on fighting the opioid crisis, VanDerKarr is revered, he said. They see him on panels and at seminars, offering advice and learning from others.

“He is out working to help people every day,” Stewart said. “It is a 24/7 job for him.”

VanDerKarr’s nonprofit is still in its infancy. The nonprofit world can be tricky to navigate, but he’s confident it will grow and help establish more drug courts across Ohio and the country—eventually saving more lives.

“There’s nothing like seeing someone actually turn their life around,” VanDerKarr said. 

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SEMIFInalISt He wants addiction treated as a mental health issue instead of a crime.

Former Franklin County Municipal Court Judge Scott VanDerKarr holds a teddy bear given to him by the son of a drug addict that VanDerKarr’s drug-court program helped rehabilitate.

SEPTEMBER 2018

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8/23/18 5:59 PM

WE FIGHT

WE WIN THANK YOU to this year’s Everyday Heroes and to all of central Ohio’s volunteers who make a difference in our community.

UNITED, we become a powerful force for good.

#fightpovertycbus

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8/22/18 4:24 PM