I am the secretary for the Guardians of the Children which is a non profit group of motorcycle riders (NOT a club full of the bad guys that most people think of when thinking about motorcycle riders) who care deeply about helping abused children.
Most commonly, we get a call from either CPS (Child Protective Services) or Crime Victims that there is a child who has been removed from their current living situation due to physical and/or emotional abuse. All of our current cases are of young, ages 6 month to 10 years, children who have been sexually abused, raped or severely beaten. The legal guardian(s) of the child often need to feel safe from the perpetrator who sometimes makes threatening calls, drive-bys etc. Also, when attending court the families of the perps will stand outside the Courthouse and make verbal threats and be verbally abusive to the "new" family. Funny how the perps families are always intimidated when they see motorcycle riders surrounding the "new families". We just show up and they pretty much just leave. They also know that we work with the local police department and that the police are a short phone call away.
Another important action that we take is to attend Court with the child/children. Under Texas law, an underage child who is testifying can not have family members present. Weird, I know, but it seems that the Court is afraid that the child may be intimidated by the family and not be completely honest. So, since the Guardians of the Children members have gotten to know the child and he/she trusts us, and since we are not kin to the child we CAN and DO attend court with the child. It means a lot for the little one to see friendly faces in the courtroom. With the permission of the Judge we often can bring the child into the empty courtroom the day or night before to familiarize them with where everyone will sit, etc.
We also provide toys at Christmas, school supplies, clothes etc. Also take them out for pizza, bowling, etc and have even babysat while the legal guardians (often times grandparents) can get some time away for an evening alone. The legal guardians know and trust us and know that the children will be safe.
Now, to my question to all of my wonderful quilters here - - does anyone have any ideas how we can a) raise money, b) find more ways to help the kids, c) know of any sites on the internet that help out non profit groups?
It came to mind to send out this appeal after reading a post about Angel Food Ministries. I'll just bet some of you know of other sources.
Thanks for reading my whole long story, but believe me this was only a brief description.