The Pay it Forward crew had the opportunity to visit the Senior Line Dancing Group in Northeast DC for Senior week at the Turkey Thicket Recreation Center. The line dancing teachers have been instructing within the community since 2012 and say it helps to keep them young and is a great sense of community and camaraderie.
We wanted to surprise the members of the Senior Line Dancing Group with a special goodie bag to show our appreciation for what they are doing in the community. The goodie bags include everyday goods to make life easier as well as treats from Madison Square Bakery.
Upcounty Hub is a program that provides resources for our senior citizens and families in Montogomery County. Maureen Umeh met with the coordinator, Grace Rivera-Oven, to learn more about what they are doing.
Upcounty Hub started during the pandemic 2 years ago when they began feeding 23 families and they are now feeding about 1300 families a week. They are focused on making sure senior citizens get everything they need because so many spend time home alone.
The volunteers have the heart to serve others and spend a lot of their time handing out food and everyday needs. Easterns Automotive Group wanted to pay it forward with a special surprise. We surprised them with gift bags to everyone within the program.
Teenagers can face many challenges, and for young girls struggling with body image and lacking confidence or support, it can be especially difficult. An organization in Bowie is looking to change that, inspiring young ladies to be bold, brilliant, and beautiful.
Dr. Jacqueline Marshall has been in education for over 20 years and is the founder of the Bold, Brilliant, Beautiful Girls Youth Empowerment group that she started in 2019. She saw the need to help young women find their voice and feel empowered.
Parents like Monica Freeman, who has two daughters apart of the group, noticed the positive changes that have taken place with the help of Bold, Brilliant, Beautiful. Aaliyah Waterman is a program graduate now in college who loved her experience learning about financial literacy, finding her voice, gaining confidence, and even helping within the community.
Easterns Automotive Group wanted to pay it forward as well by giving them a $2,000 donation. Joel Bassam joined with a special message. “We want to support your cause of empowering the young women of that community by preparing them for college, gaining financial literacy, and helping them with body acceptance by donating $2,000 to your programs to continue to support the young ladies of that community.”
If you want to learn more about this organization or to get involved, please visit www.bbbyeg.org.
As soon as the lowest-income seniors in Washington get the call that they can move to Sarah’s Circle, they know it will change their lives. Most of the people who come to Sarah’s Circle come from unfortunate and unsafe places.
“We’ve been homeless. Where we were living was very dangerous. Sometimes you step outside, and you were afraid. Now I step outside I’m not afraid any more. Thank God,” said D.C. resident Joe Boomer.
Sarah’s Circle provides affordable housing for low-income seniors in one of the most expensive neighborhoods in Washington, D.C. The renovated building allows seniors to thrive independently, and to help prevent food insecurity, the organization also offers hot meals to the community and more.
According to Sarah’s Circle Executive Director Jessica Petro, the organization plans to expand to other neighborhoods since waiting lists are hundreds and hundreds deep.
Easterns Automotive Group saw Sarah’s Circle Story as part of 7News On Your Side’s Helping Hands initiative last year, and they were moved by the organization’s mission. They were surprised with this message from Joel Bassam at Easterns Automotive Group.
“What is there not to say about Sarah’s Circle? You guys support low-income seniors in every way imaginable. Housing, nutrition, health, and exercise, it’s simply incredible. We want to support your mission to help those in need by donating $2,000 to your cause. Continue doing the amazing work you’re doing,” Bassam said.
Petro and the residents at Sarah’s Circle were blown away by the generosity and are looking forward to how the money will enrich the good work being done there.
In Arlington, Va., a two-time Paralympic swimmer helps people with disabilities enhance and maintain their fitness by sharing her talents and knowledge.
Gialamas founded AMG Fitness to provide online adaptive workouts for people with disabilities. She has arthrogryposis, which affects joint mobility in her hands and legs. She walks with assistance from braces that help support her.
“I went to London and Rio (Paralympic Games),” Gialamas said. “I swam Division One at Loyola University (Maryland). I’m from Chicago, and I started swimming at three. I retired from swimming at the age of 24. After London and Rio, I found myself in a position where COVID hit, and everything was going online. But no adaptive resources were hitting online, and I wanted to create a solution.”
Following her swimming career, Gialamas realized there wasn’t a commonplace for people with disabilities to seek out exercise information. “That weird time in quarantine when everything went online and everyone was posting workouts in their living rooms,” she said. “As someone with a disability, I was like, there has to be something out there that has to be people doing this, and I didn’t find a lot of what AMG is for varying disabilities.”
For example, there are workout videos online for people in wheelchairs, but not necessarily for people like Gialamas with limited mobility issues.
“I really wanted to create a place for people to not only be athletes and feel really good in their bodies,” she said. “But also not be athletes and just feel really great in their fitness spaces.”
Gialamas’ exercise videos incorporate a lot of bodyweight exercises. For example, stationary jumping jacks, forward punches, and others involve lightweight dumbbells. “It’s all adaptive workouts, all free, and it’s all at home,” Gialamas said. “I don’t want people to have to pay for any of the workouts, so I rely on donations and strategic partnerships to keep AMG free.” Gialamas’ videos don’t coach a class; they offer instructions for exercises you can perform at home compared to other videos you might find on the internet.
Her dedication to helping others inspired Easterns Automotive Group.
“Hi, this is Joel Bassam at Easterns Automotive Group. I was amazed to learn about the AMG Fitness Foundation and Alyssa the way that you have turned your passion for fitness into a way to help others with adaptive workouts. It’s something that I think should be admired, and you are an inspiration to athletes all over the United States. We want to support this cause and increase your community size by donating $2,000 to the AMG Fitness Foundation so you can continue to share those workouts and keep everyone in shape. Keep doing the amazing work that you are doing.”
Gialamas was so pleasantly surprised by the generous donation from Easterns Automotive and was eager to start using it to help people in her community and far beyond.
“I am so shocked,” Gialamas said. “This will help so many people. There are so many fitness kits we can do with this money and the incredible things. I cannot believe the support I have got. Thank you so much.”
A local organization works tirelessly to support families who received the diagnosis or have children who are receiving treatment in local hospitals. Both Maryann Mayhood and Laura Tierney have experienced firsthand what it’s like to have a child with a heart condition. Mayhood’s son Joseph was born with Transposition of the Great Arteries (TGA), and Tierney’s son Lincoln was born with Tetralogy of Fallot with Pulmonary Atresia.
They call themselves heart moms and take pride in Mended Little Hearts (MLH), a nonprofit organization that helps families navigate life with child heart disease. Mayhood continued, “We stick together because no one else knows what you’re going through like a heart mom.”
Mended Little Hearts is helping families by providing resources, tools, and support. They transitioned from in-person visits to dropping off lunches and bravery bags during the pandemic. They partnered with Lost Dog Cafe, which helps to provide lunches to children and their families at children’s hospitals.
“To be able to have these lunches and have real food,” Tierney laughed. “No offense to the hospitals but it gets old, it really does.”
Joel Bassam with Easterns Automotive Group loves the organization’s work in the community.
“Our hearts were touched by the Mended Little Hearts program. This volunteer-led initiative is absolutely incredible. We want to support the bravery bags initiative by donating $2,000, so you can keep supporting these kids,” Bassam said.
“That helps so much. Thank you, Easterns!” Mayhood said in tears. “That goes so far. That’s what you get in a year, so that’s really big.”
The donation will allow Mended Little Hearts to continue feeding patients and their families.
Curtis Pride has played professional baseball for over 23 years, including 11 years in the major leagues with six different teams.
As a deaf baseball player, his biggest challenge was communicating with his teammates and coaches on the field. After he retired from playing professional baseball, the athletic director for Gallaudet University approached him with an exciting opportunity.
Gallaudet University is the world’s only university in which all programs and services are designed to accommodate deaf and hard-of-hearing students.
Curtis Pride took over Gallaudet University’s vacant head baseball coaching job to help deaf and hard of hearing athletes pursue their dreams. With help from partners like Eastern Automotive, Pride helped build a winning program.
We are honored that we could help Pride build a winning program. For the first time in five years, Gallaudet had their first winning season where they won 25 games, beat four top 20 teams in the country, and succeeded in their division.
Since Steve Park’s family-owned taekwondo studio in Northwest DC opened more than 25 years ago, Little Lights has served families with some of the lowest incomes in Washington, D.C.
After Steve met a young kid who struggled with reading, he felt heartbroken for students who needed help in school and a mentor relationship.
Now, Little Lights offers a variety of after-school programs for hundreds of children between the ages of 3 and 18 years old, including tutoring, mentoring, and more.
When there was a school teacher shortage last summer, Little Lights was there to help D.C. families in need.
With Little Lights’ help and support, all six of her children will pass, said Kourtney Mills, a mom of six.
Little Lights recently launched a college and career readiness program, which assists students in enrolling in college and setting them up for success after graduation. In addition, Little Lights offers job training to adults. Since its founding, the non-profit has grown beyond just a program. It has become an integral part of the community in the process.
“We build deep relationships with families. We even hire adults from the community to come work and be employed at our center,” Park said. “We develop the relationship long-term. Even during the pandemic, we would call parents every single week and have zoom chats, provide tablets that have internet, and act as an extended family for our students and adults, so they do have that support system that they often lack. It’s very easy for students to fall through the cracks when that support system isn’t there, and the safety net isn’t there. We try to provide that level of depth and support for all of our families.”
Touched by the fantastic works Little Lights is doing in our community, we surprised them with a check for $2,000 to go towards their incredible initiative.
Park was extremely thankful for the generous gift from the Helping Hands initiative. “We are excited to put it into our career and college readiness program and help it to grow and help more students,” Park said. “This is wonderful. Wow. I’m so touched. It’s so generous. This will really help.”
The Armed Forces Retirement home is the nation’s oldest home for enlisted military veterans, founded in 1851. The bond between the veterans here is like no other.
The home’s mission for vibrant living is supported by the Old Soldiers Home Foundation, founded in 2017 by David Pauly, a veteran who lived at the Armed Forces Retirement Home before his passing. Through the work of the foundation, his legacy lives on.
The foundation relies on community support, and to help further their mission Easterns Automotive joined with something special. Joel Bassam surprised the foundation with $2,000.
When it comes to homeless shelters, socks are the most requested item but are rarely donated. Through the PAL Mentorship Program, Prince George’s County’s Office of Community First hosts this annual sock drive to support people experiencing homelessness.
“This is about us giving back, it’s about addressing homelessness and giving back to others when those socks are much-needed items, including keeping people warm and preventing frostbite,” said Prince George’s County Police Chief Aziz.
Easterns Automotive Group heard about their initiative and surprised them with a truck full of $2,000 worth of socks to support it. Corporal Black greatly appreciated Easterns Automotive Group’s generous donation to launch this year’s drive.