OPINION
WOW! Here's one way WW readers make a difference. At the end of November, we urged you to help four of our favorite community organizations ("Ways of Giving," WW, Nov. 24, 1998). Did you ever! As the following demonstrates, you came through in a big way. The Wallace Medical Concern (P.O. Box 6972, Portland 97228; 274-1277) provides services to homeless street youths and adults and to medically needy families in the Portland area. As the smallest of the four organizations, it was able to track your help most accurately. According to Executive Director Kathy Hammock, you made at least $3,555 in contributions to WMC in December. Furthermore, Hammock says her organization got "a ton of phone calls from potential new volunteers." We also urged you to help the Cascade AIDS Project's Housing Warehouse (620 SW 5th Ave., suite 300, Portland 97204; 223-5907, ext. 149), which makes donated furniture available to individuals and families in their own homes or in living units provided by CAP. According to coordinator Kate Mosca, WW readers "made my life crazy in December. My program went through the roof." As a result, CAP's waiting list for furniture has been almost cleared, and the warehouse's pickup schedule is full until February. In addition, CAP experienced a significant (30 percent) increase in year-end fund-raising--a dramatic turnabout given the general decline in AIDS philanthropy recently ("A Plague out of Vogue," WW, Dec. 9, 1998). According to Amy Brown, development director at the Oregon Community Foundation, "Willamette Week...helped SMART generate more than $12,000 in cash contributions from individuals during the month of December." SMART (200 SW Market St., suite 170, Portland 97210; 916-2000, ext. 4563, or 833-4838 in Washington County) is an acronym for Start Making a Reader Today. The group organizes volunteers who read with kindergartners and first- and second-graders lagging in language development. Valerie Anderson, SMART's area manager, says you represent 25 percent of her organization's new volunteers. Finally, there is Sisters of the Road Cafe (133 NW 6th Ave., Portland 97209; 222-5694), which provides the homeless with food and a safe place to congregate. In December, it received some $48,000 in individual donations--much of it attributable to your generosity. This enabled Sisters to obtain an additional $19,500 matching grant. In addition, at least 30 of you went through volunteer training in December. It is impossible to describe the gratitude these organizations express about your generosity--to say nothing of the pride we feel in having you as readers. At the same time, we'd be remiss not to point out that, as with all community-based organizations, more help is needed. At Wallace Medical Concern, for example, Executive Director Hammock's computer crashes nearly every day. Her life would be a good deal less frustrating--and more productive--if she had a new machine (ideally one with a Pentium processor). SMART needs readers in North, Northeast and outer-Southeast Portland, as well as bilingual readers in Hillsboro and Cornelius. You can help Sisters of the Road by attending its Winterfolk XI benefit with Utah Phillips at 7:30 pm on Saturday, Feb. 6, at the Aladdin Theater. Finally, once February arrives, Mosca can schedule more furniture pickups for CAP's Housing Warehouse. In the meantime, take a moment to pat yourselves on the back for your good works over the holidays.
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