This month, the JCMG Laser & Vein Center is proud to sponsor the Zonta 13th Annual Women of Achievement Yellow Rose Luncheon! The Zonta Yellow Rose Luncheon is a yearly event honoring local women for noteworthy achievements in their careers or as community volunteers. Please join us to recognize these women who help make a difference in our community.

Tuesday, May 22nd
Capitol Plaza Hotel
Women’s Expo begins at 9:00 am; luncheon is at 11:30 am
The JCMG Laser & Vein Center will have a booth at the Women’s Expo, so stop by!

Tickets are $30 each; proceeds from the luncheon will benefit Zonta’s Second Chance Scholarship Fund. For more information, please visit www.zontajcmo.org. We hope to see you there!

We have a new addition to our Charity of the Month program. This March, our donations will go to The Salvation Army. Our local Salvation Army is a 41-bed facility that provides housing for men, women, and children in times of crisis. They provide meals, a safe environment, beds and linens, toiletries, clothing vouchers, case management, referral services, and classes. We have many exciting options for using the money to fund future projects. We will let you know how the funds are to be used over the next few months. We are also ready to disperse checks for the Client’s Choice Charities from December. Watch for a breakdown on how the money was used in our April newsletter.

For the third year in a row, the Cole County Senior Nutrition Center is our February Charity of the Month. We continue to partner with this organization because we believe in its mission to help our seniors maintain their health, dignity, and independence to the greatest extent possible. This mission is met in two ways: first, there is a home meal delivery option in which seniors who are homebound can receive nutritious meals delivered to their door. This service can help keep people in their homes for as long as possible if meal purchasing and preparation is a primary problem. The second option is the two Senior Centers that serve mid-day meals for a suggested donation, although no one is turned away. They provide a daily hot, nutritious meal along with the benefit of the chance to socialize with other seniors. We are happy to be able to help our Jefferson City seniors. For more information on these services, or information on how you can help out, contact the Cole County Senior Nutrition Center at 573-634-8020 for the Clark site or 573-635-4120 for the Mall site.

January is always a month of dreams. We reflect on where we are and set goals to achieve our dreams in the upcoming year. For some women in mid-Missouri, the dream of a job is high on the priority list. Unfortunately, there are women who do not have the resources or confidence to successfully prepare to enter the workforce. That is where volunteer organizations like Dreams to Reality come into play. The mission of Dreams to Reality is to help low-income women of Missouri meet their employment goals and build self-confidence by providing appropriate interview and business apparel, motivation, and follow-up support. The JCMG Laser & Vein Center is excited to partner with them again in 2012. Dreams to Reality will be our designated charity for January. They will receive a donation based on a portion of our proceeds for the month. We will also partner with them in a couple of other ways this year: in January, we will be collecting and personally donating new and gently worn scrubs, and we will also provide makeup consultations throughout the year as needed. If you are interested in donating scrubs, drop them by our reception desk. If you would like more information on donating to or volunteering for this organization, visit dreamstoreality-jc.org.

Every month we choose a local not-for-profit organization to receive our monthly charitable donation. This December, we thought it would be fun to let you choose the charities. For every purchase made or service received we will make a donation to your favorite charity. We do ask that the charities be local and not for profit. Fill out one of our ornaments with your favorite charity and, at the end of the month, we will divide our donation between the charities chosen, based on the number of ornaments they have accumulated. Put your name and email on the back and we will send you an update in January on where the donations went. We will also enter everyone that participates in this for a chance to spend an evening at the Fabulous Fox enjoying some of the great shows they have this holiday season. So stop by this December and help us celebrate the gift of giving.

This month our donation will be split between two amazing organizations in Central Missouri. I was fortunate to have the chance to have a firsthand experience with both of them the other evening.

November 1st was the third annual Forget Me Not Gala for the Central Missouri Foster Care and Adoption Association. This organization provides backpacks with personal care items for children entering foster care. They staff a store foster families can visit to receive gently worn clothing. They also offer 18 year olds aging out of the system a chance to work with a mentor for a three year period. The gala was a wonderful celebration of the successful foster and mentoring relationships that have taken place in our community.

That same evening I had the honor to pick up my father, a World War II vet, on his arrival home from the Central Missouri Honor Flight trip to Washington, D.C. The honor flight takes veterans to Washington, D.C. to see the monuments dedicated to their service. For twenty-four hours these veterans are treated like rock stars and receive the thanks they deserve for their service to our country. Words cannot express the emotions I felt watching their return.

The JCMG Laser & Vein Center is privileged to have a part in helping these organizations fulfill their mission. We are happy to let both the foster children in our community and the veterans who have served us know they are not forgotten!

For information on how you can volunteer or donate to these amazing organizations contact them at:

Central Missouri Honor Flight
1400 Forum Blvd., Ste. 28, Box 334
Columbia, MO 65203 or call 573.256.1930

Central Missouri Foster Care and Adoption Association
ccfosteradopt@gmail.com
PO Box 1505
Jefferson City, MO 65102 or call 573.298.0258

This October the Rape and Abuse Crisis Service, otherwise known as RACS, is again our Charity of the Month. I asked Pam Otto, Outreach and Volunteer Coordinator, to share a few words on RACS and its mission:

Since 1980, the Rape and Abuse Crisis Service has been providing many needed services to victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking – all confidential and at no cost to the clients. RACS has a beautiful 36-bed shelter with laundry and dining facilities, and a wonderful play area for the kids. They offer food, clothing, personal care items, and other necessities to the families who come there for safety. The need for this service has increased dramatically, as the number of bed nights provided has risen 55% since 2006. Group, individual, and outreach counseling are available for adult and child shelter clients, as well as individuals from the community, to help them cope with the violence that has been a part of their lives. A legal advocate assists victims through the legal processes and with filing for orders of protection where needed. Other advocacy services include accompaniment to the hospital for victims of battering or rape and providing crisis intervention and emotional support both within Jefferson City and in our outlying counties. RACS offers a hotline that is available 24/7 for support of individuals in crisis as well as to help victims assess their situations and options, to provide referrals, and to offer support and information to those who want to help someone in an abusive situation. Additionally, RACS provides outreach education presentations tailored to specific needs on subjects such as Dynamics of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, Date Rape Prevention, Healthy vs. Unhealthy Relationships, and Good Touch/Bad Touch. RACS is able to offer these services to victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse with the support provided by this community. In return, providing victims with the opportunity to regain confidence, control, and direction in their lives helps keep our community strong.

I also asked Pam to share some of the pressing needs at RACS. She stated that they are really desperate right now for volunteers to help with childcare for their Thursday evening Domestic Violence Support Group. Right now, they have 43 people in shelter, and 30 of those are kids. (Both of those numbers are records for them!) Their current childcare volunteers are wearing out, as you might imagine; they need a bit of relief! They could also use more help with their donations on Tuesdays, or even with grocery shopping on the weekend. Although they use volunteers in each of these areas every week, they don’t expect an every-week commitment from volunteers. Donation-wise, their greatest needs at present are for laundry detergent (regular and HE), kitchen and bathroom cleaning products, sugar, cooking oil, diapers (especially sizes 3, 4, and 5), and baby wipes. They’ll be doing Christmas Family Adoptions again this year, too, and will have opportunities available there for other donations as well. If anyone is interested in helping through volunteering or by making a donation, they can contact Pam at 634-8346, ext. 7. Your patronage of the Laser & Vein Center helps support this cause, but if you would like to help on your own I know they would be happy to have you!

This September we have once again chosen Big Brothers Big Sisters as our charity of the month. As kids go back to school, we are so fortunate that our community has an organization like Big Brothers Big Sisters that helps kids who need positive mentors in their life. Program Director Lee Knernshield shares a few words on the organization: “Missouri Valley Big Brothers Big Sisters mission is to make a positive difference in the lives of children by providing them with a professionally supported one-to-one mentoring relationship with a caring and committed volunteer. Most of the children that we serve are from single parent homes and have a limited relationship with the parent who resides outside of the home. Our goal is to provide these children with a “bigger than life” volunteer who consistently spends time with them and makes them feel special. With mentoring, children’s grades, attitudes and self-confidence all go up. Contributions are used to help support our current matches and further expand our reach to children waiting for that special “Big Brother” or “Big Sister”.”

JCMG Laser & Vein Center is happy to help them achieve this mission. They are always in need of volunteers, otherwise known as Bigs. If you would like information on becoming a Big you can contact Missouri Valley Big Brothers Big Sisters at 573.634.3290 or email Lee Knernshield at lknernschield@jcymca.org.

Again this year our designated charity for August is Council for Drug Free Youth. According to their mission, Council for Drug Free Youth (CDFY) is an active group of concerned parents united by a common goal to fight the problem of alcohol and other drugs in our community and show young people that an alcohol and drug-free life is not only possible, but fulfilling. They offer programs our local schools can bring in or transport students to in order to learn about living a drug and alcohol-free life. These programs start as early as kindergarten and run through 9th grade.

Last year they introduced a new program, How to Save a Life. This program was an assembly designed for high school students and went to both Helias and Jefferson City. Our donation funded one of the assemblies and assisted in funding the other. If you had students at one of these schools, I would love to get feedback on what your student thought about these assemblies. You can post those on Facebook, comment on this blog post, or email me at bprasad@jcmg.org.

Go to www.jccdfy.org for more information on the programs Council for Drug Free Youth offer or if you are interested in volunteering or donating to this cause yourself. And, once again, thank you for your support: it allows us to contribute to this organization that has been so valuable to the youth of our community.