“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” – Fred “Mister” Rogers
The pandemic is entering its ninth month, and, in that time, many local “helpers” have stepped up to the plate to lend a hand to those in need. The pandemic has also strengthened and revitalized existing efforts to help those less fortunate. These “helpers” come from all walks of life: some are business owners, some are local leaders with large networks, but many are ordinary folks who simply want to do something nice for someone else. Here are some of their stories; there are many more out there – just look for the helpers.
Families In Need I Support & Help (FINISH)
It’s important – especially during this time of crisis – to focus on what you can control. Resident Jeremiah Sawyer did just that when he started the foundation, Families In Need I Support & Help (FINISH), assisting North Royalton families in need. Feeling frustrated with changes in school learning and distraught over the pandemic, Sawyer said he decided to “take control of what I could” and help families in North Royalton. He started FINISH in August.
“We did a bike ride fundraiser out of Memorial Park that raised about $2,000 and we did a Facebook Fundraiser that raised about $800,” Sawyer said in an email interview. “We also did a GoFundMe (fundraiser) that raised about $300. Then working primarily with a North Royalton social worker and St. Albert the Great, we identified families who needed help.”
To date, Sawyer’s foundation has helped five local families with everything from groceries, utility bills, car payments and other forms of assistance. FINISH is currently helping a sixth family with car payments. Sawyer found FINISH’s first family on Facebook and worked to donate clothing and supplies to them. A Facebook fundraiser raised $1,200 that went towards groceries and a title for the individual’s family car. The second family received help with groceries and their phone/Internet bill. The third family had 10 individuals living in one house, Sawyer said.
“They have only one car and were going to lose it,” Sawyer said. “So, we paid two months of their car payments.”
FINISH helped a fourth family with food and supplies and put the mom in touch with a social worker and the local food bank, Sawyer said. FINISH’s fifth family was comprised of a grandmother taking care of her two grandchildren and her own elderly mother.
“We raised more than $700 to help pay her bills and get her phone turned back on,” Sawyer said.
To learn more and track their progress and news, visit “FINISH – Families In Need I Support & Help” on Facebook.
‘We call her an angel from God’
North Royalton resident Michelle Warren moved to North Royalton with her two children in July with “nothing but our three outfits,” she said in a telephone interview. A victim of an abusive relationship, Warren was struggling to find her footing in her new town. Her sister, Terry Boyle, also of North Royalton, put a call out for assistance and that’s when resident Dawn Carbone-McDonald came to their rescue.
“Because of Dawn, my kids have clothing and beds to sleep on. She gave me a sofa bed to sleep on as well,” Warren said.
Carbone-McDonald also put Boyle in touch with an agency that helped them pay two car payments.
“She does it out of the kindness of her heart,” Boyle said.
Carbone-McDonald also helped fellow resident Wendy Suto-King, cleaning her home while Suto-King was hospitalized for illness. She’s also been helping an older adult on Drake Road who is living alone while his wife is in assisted living.
Ask Carbone-McDonald to talk about her goodwill efforts and she’ll tell you it’s just how she was raised.
“I can remember my mom just always going above and beyond to help people, our doors were always open, if anybody needed anything,” Carbone-McDonald said in a recent telephone interview.
When the pandemic struck in March, she walked neighborhoods, distributed masks and educated residents about health and safety. In the nine months since Covid-19 struck, she’s helped 10 families with donations and other acts of kindness.
“Put yourself in other people’s shoes,” she said of finding ways to be a force for good. “It starts a wave of hope and love. You can start a fire just by lighting a match.”
Paying it forward
After reading a post on social media from a struggling widowed mom in North Royalton, Kelly Markworth was moved to do something to help the woman out. A single mom who had once struggled herself and received help from strangers, Markworth decided to pay her gratitude forward by setting up a fundraiser for the woman on Facebook.
“It sounded like she was drowning, and I just felt compelled to help,” Markworth said.
Donations trickled in slowly at first, in small increments of $10 and $20, but quickly grew to donations of $50, $100 and even $250. In the end, Markworth’s fundraiser raised more $1,500 for the widowed mother of two boys.
“I’ve talked with her a lot and we’ve become friends. I was really touched by her story,” Markworth said. “I’ve been a single mom for most of my adult life and I’ve struggled too, and people have been very kind to me. It’s happened more than once where I’ve been at a restaurant with my kids and someone has paid for our meals. Once, a woman walked past our table at Steak ‘n Shake and placed a gift card on our table. People have brought me food when I didn’t have food in my fridge. We’ve had help and I’ve been so blessed that I believe in paying it forward to keep that karma moving forward.”
Markworth notes that people can do all sorts of kind things to help each other out.
“People can help in small ways. They can donate to food banks or get involved with local churches,” she said. “I think it’s just about wanting to help because there are so many ways. You can donate your time to a local animal organization if animals are your passion. You can reach out directly to people who are struggling. There are just generous people out there and North Royalton is a great community for that. It’s about taking that first step to reach out and deciding how you want to help.”
Hope for the Homeless CLE
Once a month – and twice a month when it’s cold – North Royalton resident Deanna Bias Roark stands in the Saint Malachi parking lot in Cleveland handing out items to the homeless. She volunteers with the nonprofit organization Hope for the Homeless CLE and sets up racks of clothing for the homeless to go through, along with totes of shoes and boots, and a table holding snacks, sandwiches, water, warm soup, hot cocoa, and coffee. Bias Roark is out there each month no matter the weather or a global pandemic.
“We offer them clothing, tents, tarps, hats, gloves, boots, shoes, hygiene bags and anything that we can to help them,” she said of the monthly meet-ups. “We usually see 20 to 60 people every visit. Our homeless friends are so grateful for the help! We can always use sleeping bags, tents, tarps, hand warmers, shoes, boots, coats, and stuff like that. Our organization is just made up of a handful of people who volunteer their time to go and help others.”
Bias Roark posts donation requests to the popular North Royalton Parents Discuss It Facebook page and donations always flood in. Hope for the Homeless CLE visits Medina as well. When the homeless get into housing, the group will work to furnish their residence with donations of furniture, kitchenware, bathroom items and more, Bias Roark said.
“It’s just a group of people,” Bias Roark said of Hope for the Homeless CLE. “Chuck and Patty Hasenstab have the organization with a bunch of friends who just do it to be kind.”
Rise in Love
This Christ-centered, North Royalton-based foundation stemmed from an observation its President/Founding Board Member made while volunteering for another agencies.
“I was volunteering a lot and Rise in Love was born out of the frustration I had when seeing people need help and continually needing help. No one ever asked, ‘what can we do to help you not need help every month?’” said Barbara Sternberg of Rise in Love. “It didn’t seem like anything was being done to really solve the problem.”
A former small business marketer for more than 25 years, Sternberg began formulating a plan to create an outlet that aimed to “stop the bleeding,” rather than cover it with a band-aid. In 2015, Rise in Love was established with a mission to “provide immediate resources for individuals and families, as well as assisting in developing the capability to help them rise above their suffering.” Their charity focuses on suburban poverty and is unique in that it creates individualized plans for each person it helps.
“We work with people at a real level. Our programs fit the people they are helping,” Sternberg said in a telephone interview.
Rise in Love also makes sure its volunteer-base is successful.
“The way volunteers are treated is very important to me,” Sternberg said. “I am always making sure they are comfortable, joy-filled, happy and reaching their service potential. If people call us wanting to help out, I have a long conversation with them to learn where their heart is at and we mold them and move them forward in their volunteering.”
Rise in Love runs a monthly food/home supply distribution and a free monthly hot meal. To learn more and to see news and other updates including a distribution day schedule, visit them on Facebook at facebook.com/riseinlove.org.
‘Copy and Paste’
Kindness spreads quickly on social media. Tracy Marx of Howard Hanna Realty in North Royalton decided to copy and paste a popular message circulating on Facebook. With the hashtags, “JoinTheCause” and “CopyAndPasteIfYouCanAndAreWilling,” Marx posted: “We are now a solid eight months into this. If you are not working, not getting a paycheck, struggling to make ends meet and running out of food or necessities, please don’t let yourself or your kids go to sleep with an empty stomach. Don’t be afraid or embarrassed to send me a private message. I am more than happy to help. I will drop and go, or order for delivery. No one has to know. What’s understood never has to be explained. I am serious. We have to stick together!!!”
Her post has garnered attention from followers (though she’s not doing it for the notoriety), with one man chiming in that he will assist her in her efforts to help. It’s exactly the chain reaction of kindness she was hoping to create and foster.
“I think we’re all ready to turn the corner, get this thing under control and be nice to one another,” she said in a telephone interview. She hopes her Facebook post makes its way to someone who has a need.
“The more comments, the more maybe people will see it,” she said. “I will help in any way they need it. I will help with groceries, I will help monetarily, whatever the need is.”
Note: Howard Hanna Real Estate offices like those in North Royalton, Brecksville and Strongsville serve as drop-off sites for Coats for Kids collecting new and like-new winter coats for children up to 18 years old. This year, many offices including North Royalton and Brecksville will arrange for local porch pick-ups of donated coats. Call local offices to inquire.
By SARA MACHO HILL
Contributing Writer