Troubled children in central or western New York State have a place to go called Hillside Children’s Center. With more than 60 sites, the Hillside Family of Agencies serves over 12,000 dependent, neglected, and behaviorally or emotionally disturbed children and teens, along with their families. With a caring environment, Hillside’s goal is to turn frowns into smiles with counseling, support and by offering gifts and games to children.
Whenever possible, Hillside tries to provide services in the home and community because they believe that nothing can replace the value of a strong family. That has always been their philosophy so the Hillside Family of Agencies form a partnership with parents. All of Hillside’s services, such as youth and parent support, crisis counseling, and general “help desk” information, are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Jim Germano, purchasing agent for Hillside Children’s Center in Rochester, New York, says, “Hillside’s mission is to serve children and families. We try to bring smiles to their faces by giving items directly to children, their parents and other clients.”
Hillside is the largest nonprofit provider of child welfare in the northeast, so most of their funding comes from state resources. They do have thousands of donors which include individuals, corporations, foundations, and community organizations, but it is hard to find items such as toys, stuffed animals, games, sporting goods, dolls, baseball cards, and party items. Those things just are not in the budget.
Resource Saves Money
Hillside Children’s Center had to look elsewhere to get the items they needed, and that resource had to be cost effective. Twenty years ago, HCC discovered NAEIR, the National Association for the Exchange of Industrial Resources, located in Galesburg, Illinois.
NAEIR’s membership program helps nonprofit organizations stretch tight budgets. NAEIR accepts donations of new, overstock inventory from U.S. businesses and redistributes those goods to nonprofit organizations in need of toys, games and other activities for children, as well as office supplies, maintenance items, decorations and other necessities for children and parents.
Organizations that become recipients or members of NAEIR, pay dues ranging from $495 to $595 per year, plus shipping and handling, and the merchandise itself is free. Members choose what they need from 200-page catalogs, special offer fliers, and an on-line site, NAEIR e-xpress, at www.naeir.org.
Membership Rewards
Since 1983, HCC’s membership has helped children that have been neglected, abused, or suffering emotionally. Gifts from NAEIR have helped lift their spirits. Party supplies help brighten the holiday season for children. “The Halloween assortment goes over well, along with Valentine’s Day and the Thanksgiving dinnerware,” says Germano. “And, the huge teddy bears and Booxies (stuffed animals with storybooks) are a major hit.”
Germano uses the NAEIR catalog to select items to use as prizes for bingo and other games the children play. With 60 sites, he requests everything he possibly can from those 200 pages. Hillside has received lawn care products, maintenance carts, tool boxes and work gloves from NAEIR to meet the agencies’ maintenance needs. Other helpful items include tape, appointment books, pens, flashlights, office and school supplies.
Germano believes that the gifts have a positive effect on the children at HCC. A former client agrees, “I am very grateful to Hillside for their wonderful help. I wouldn’t have been able to make it without them.”
According to Gary Smith, president and chief executive officer of NAEIR, “We have collected and redistributed over $2 billion worth of donated goods over the past 26 years, and many nonprofit organizations such as Hillside Children’s Center rely on NAEIR. for supplementing reduced budgets. Our members receive an average of $18,000 worth of new supplies each year, which is roughly a 30-1 return on their dues investment.”
American businesses have been donating to NAEIR since 1977. Corporations that make a contribution, earn a federal income tax deduction for donating their overstock and discontinued inventory.
NAEIR, the National Association for the Exchange of Industrial Resources, is a not-for-profit distributor of supplies to nonprofit organizations including schools, churches and other federal and state agencies. NAEIR operates a 10-acre warehouse with $100 million worth of inventory from its headquarters in Galesburg, Illinois.
No comments:
Post a Comment