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The annual Operation Support Our Troops - Illinois “Rockin’” Concert is coming up this weekend at Cantigny Park in Wheaton. If you’re free Saturday afternoon and eve donate and stop by to see Beatles cover band American English and Gary Sinise’s Lt. Dan Band.
OSOT-IL has been doing these concerts annually for the last several years and as with other groups dedicated to helping our troops and their families that I’ve highlighted like SALUTE the money or goods you donate will go to a good cause because the OSOT-IL concert is run by grassroots volunteers right here in Illinois and the money and items donated go to supporting our GIs and their families. (Contrast that to the “Freedom Concerts” promoted by Sean Hannity and Ollie North which appear to have a very large portion of the donations going to Hannity and North’s salaries, etc. instead of to our troops.)
Cantigny’s beautiful, we’ll hopefully have good weather and the bands can jam. Enjoy!
Donate: Operation Support Our Troops-Illinois
Get a Ticket: OSOT-IL Rockin’ Concert, Saturday, July 19
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Rich Miller published the snailmail address for a relief fund created to assist those caught in the Wabash River flooding in central Illinois. Help if you can.
Seems like a small thing, but TV sets can be expensive to buy, let alone install and then maintain should something go wrong.
This “TVs for Vets” organization looks to be a Montana-based effort — I originally learned of it through Sen. John Tester’s (D-MT) email newsletter — but certainly an effort where a little could go a long way nonetheless. A group of folks, veterans and citizens alike, is raising money to help buy TV sets for VA clinics, etc. as a way to help improve vets’ quality of life just a bit.
Here in suburban Chicagoland, SALUTE also aids GIs and their families with financial assistance, scholarships, and other vital, often overlooked, help for veterans and their families. Their 5k/10k run & 5k walk is coming up on May 24th.
Write in comments, with a link, if you know of other such quality of life efforts.
I’m in shock. From the Herald:
Harper College trustee and Wheeling Township Democrat Committeeman Patrick Botterman died of a massive heart attack Monday.
Pat had literally just emailed me yesterday morning about helping him out on a project.
While he could be a bulldog he was a good man; and worked his tail off for the underdogs and the little guys. I’m speechless.
He will be missed, even by those who didn’t know him but were impacted by his hard work, his dedication and above all, his integrity. Whether you agreed with him or not, you always knew he’d be straight as an arrow with you.
God Bless the Botterman family and all of Pat’s many, many friends as we grieve. We lost a true patriot yesterday.
Update: Rich Miller has some info and Rep. John Fritchey offers us this eloquent eulogy.
Update 2: E Man and Yoda recall their colorful experiences with Botter Boy. Both their stories are like so many others’ — there is quite the Botterman Alumni Club out there.
Update 3: I’ve changed the site header for the next few days. Yes, Botterman was that special.
Update 4: The Arlington Heights Post reports:
In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be given to the Harper College Educational Foundation (note Patrick Botterman Scholarship Fund), 1200 W. Algonquin Road, Palatine.
You may also donate directly online at the Harper College Educational Foundation Botterman Scholarship Fund.
Food pantries nationwide are noticing a severe shortage — to the lowest levels some have seen in decades — as more and more families find themselves unable to afford higher-priced food (plus gas, shelter and other necessities of daily life) and as fewer donations are coming in (with grocers cutting back on their giving in an effort to squeeze more profits out of “not quite perfect” foodstuffs).
Take, for example, this section from a round up of national food pantry shortage stories posted at Daily Kos (read the whole thing for perspective on how wide-spread the issue is):
Dramatic price increases in food, gasoline, heating oil and other basics is resulting in a “perfect storm,” making this already the worst winter Tom Gifford, executive director of Beverly Bootstraps, has seen in 15 years. People have to cut back on food, making pantries a necessity, he said.
“Those economic factors are really grinding families down,” he said.
In Illinois, you can donate food at many local township and village offices, as well as churches and other places of worship. Or, you can find a local foodban, soup kitchen or shelter through the regional Second Harvest depositories located throughout the Prairie State. Canned veggies and fruits plus powdered milk and other staples are vital.
And while most people think of the holidays as good times to give the need is year round. Tummies don’t magically stay full just because giving spikes around Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Finally, next summer, consider “growing an extra row” — plant some extra vegetables in your garden (or for the first time if you haven’t gardened before) then donate the fresh veggies to your local pantry for distribution.
I didn’t know her all that well and had only just met her in recent years but Joy Fisher, a fixture in northwest suburban civics, recently passed away after bravely battling illness. Despite her busy professional career, Joy made time to mentor law students in order to ease their transition into the profession and she also was very active in promoting women — of all political stripes — for local leadership roles as one of the founders of the Women’s Leadership Council. She enjoyed participating in local politics and was seemingly omnipresent at various meetings and certainly at parades throughout the area. Exemplifying dedication to our shared community, Joy was also elected to a term as a Wheeling Township trustee and had served equally well on the District 21 school board.
As her name implies, despite the seriousness of some of the debates in which she stood her ground, she was always a pleasure and a true joy to be near and to know. Her soulful passion and unbending compassion made our little neck of the woods all the better. She will be dearly missed by her family, friends and colleagues alike.
Her family has asked that in lieu of flowers we offer donations to the Robert H. Lurie Cancer Center, 847-255-3520. Please consider doing so in this season of giving.
(h/t Pat)
It’s disgusting that stories like this about our own American vets are easier to find in foreign media.
Honor our veterans this Veteran’s Day.
Charity Navigator lists their unbiased rankings of the 5 best and worst veteran charities. A very good local organization for vets and their families is SALUTE and I encourage you to learn more about their efforts and donate.
The southern half of California is literally ablaze so the rationale for helping the following charities is self-explanatory:
- Salvation Army* - [Update] For those of you who choose to also vote with your wallets, Dogemperor describes in a Daily Kos diary how the Salvation Army has begun discriminating against Jewish and other folks and also may conduct “church background checks” on people, with encouragement from arch-conservative Dominionist circles. I’ll leave the link up for now since they are such a well-known organization, but you should read DE’s information about the Salvation Army (which always has been a Christian-related organization) before you decide to donate to them. [/Update]
- Charity Navigator rankings of 5 best (and 5 worst) veteran and first responder charities
And not all of the homes being lost are mansions that belong to millionaires. A great many people are going to need help rebuilding so check out Habitat for Humanity:
- Greater LA Habitat for Humanity
- Orange County Habitat for Humanity
- San Diego Habitat for Humanity
- Ventura County Habitat for Humanity
- List of all California Habitat chapters
UPDATE: In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, it was found that several charities promoted by Pres. Bush’s FEMA outfit were actually front groups for conservative organizations with a clear, biased agenda.
Dogemperor put together a diary at DKos outlining several examples of charities that have been vetted by independent sources. I recommend you read DE’s essay and suggestions.
DE also notes Charity Navigator (whose Top and Bottom 5 lists I linked to above) and Give.org as independent verifiers of charities.
Horribly busy Friday and weekend so “Worthy Causes” comes bright and early on Monday.
I read an article in last week’s Trib about a McHenry County couple, Jack and Judy Speer who discovered an overgrown (and thus, hidden) pioneer-era cemetery on their property a while back. In addition to offering to help care for the neighboring Alden Sedge Meadow greenspace, they and several volunteers dedicated themselves to restoring the resting place. Kudos to the Speers.
Their volunteerism with regards to the 766-acre meadow, plus the graveyard, next to their house reminded me of an important Chicago area organization which is also dedicated to helping preserve open space — natural preserves, clean waterways, and other greenspace.
Corlands and the Openlands Project have been working to create a comprehensive and “big picture” approach to natural areas throughout Chicagoland. They work with corporations to help them create greenspace on their office campuses. They coordinate with farmers, developers and government agencies to help plan conservation areas and buffer zones between built and natural areas. They also develop trails (both earthen and aquatic) for hiking, biking, canoeing, etc.
Their work takes place in rural, suburban, and even dense urban settings. It involves hundreds of different agencies, businesses and government organizations and many more volunteers and donors to keep it all going.
From their “About” page:
Great cities and, by extension, great urban regions, are known not only for the number of people they contain but for the quality of life they provide. Openlands’ vision for northeastern Illinois is a landscape that includes a vast network of land and water trails, tree-shaded streets and intimate public gardens within easy reach of every city dweller. It also includes parks and preserves big enough to provide natural habitat and to give visitors a sense of the vast prairies, woodlands and wetlands that were here before the cities.
If you appreciate clean air and water, vibrant places to have fun and see nature up close and personal, and want to leave a bit of Creation behind for future generations … find out what you, your business and your community can do to help Openlands and CorLands.
WXRT radio in Chicago has been promoting their latest “Live from the Archives” CD (vol. 10) so heavily it’s getting nauseating. While some of the songs on the disc are intriguing live versions of well-known tunes, the constant harping about the CD’s release is a huge turn-off.
But, the CD isn’t released as a purely profit-seeking venture. Proceeds from sales go to benefit the Little City Foundation and the National Multiple Sclerosis Society’s Greater Illinois Chapter.
Little City is based in Palatine, IL and the organization helps children and young adults with mental, behavioral and physical developmental issues. There are a variety of opportunities for folks to donate their time or money to help this great cause.
Their Mission Statement reads:
The mission of Little City Foundation is to provide state-of-the art services to help children and adults with mental retardation or other developmental, emotional and behavioral challenges to lead meaningful, productive and dignified lives.
And that’s just what they do.
Little City hosts books sales … runs an adoption program … is “teamed up” with Bears kicker Robbie Gould … and overall tries doing the best it can for the kids they try to help.
Learn how you can help by visiting their site.
A great local charity which is doing tremendous and vital work is called Salute, Inc, founded by Will and Mary Beth Beiersdorf in response to one of Will’s deployments overseas.
Their motto is to “honor the sacrifice and remember the service” of our nation’s courageous men and women in uniform. Through a variety of programs, they do just that by helping servicemen and women once they return from duty as well as assisting their families during and after deployments.
Salute’s five main endeavors are:
- Nightingale Program: Providing monetary help to families of injured servicemembers who are relocated to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago for their recovery and therapy
- Direct Assistance: Offering financial assistance to the families of troops deployed away from home
- Wounded Warrior Laptop Program: Providing new computers to wounded veterans so they can more easily access social, work, and educational opportunities
- Memorial Scholarship: Scholarship awards for students offered in memory of local fallen heroes
- Forgotten Veterans: Offering funds to improve the quality of life at hospitals, homes and facilities which provide care to vets
Learn more about their different projects and fundraising efforts by visiting their website at saluteinc.org and think about giving them a donation. Salute also organizes a variety of charitable events throughout the year and a few are coming up in future weeks (run and walk events, a golf outing, etc.).
They currently have a goal of raising $50,000 — help them get there if you can. Contributions can be donated online or sent directly to their PO Box:
Salute, Inc.
PO Box 236
Prospect Heights, Illinois 60070-0236
