Editor’s Note: This week, in his own words, Livingston Philanthropies Inc. founder and director Jeff Friedman describes how Livingston residents’ donations to LPI have helped a Newark agency, the Bessie Green Community, Inc.
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It’s gratifying to see how our Livingston friends and nieghbors have come together to benefit a key Livingston Philanthropies, Inc. (LPI) distribution partner, the Bessie Green Community, Inc. in Newark.
Known among its neighbors as “The Red Door,” the Bessie Green Community, located at North Reformed Church on Broad Street, has been serving the underprivileged of Newark since 1978. As one of LPI’s founding distribution partners, Bessie Green has received Livingston’s generous donations of new and gently used coats, family clothing, toiletries and cosmetics gift bags since LPI’s inception over eight years ago.
Bessie Green’s soup kitchen is just one of the programs the non-profit offers. Providing hot meals, clothing and bags of food, the Bessie Green Community seeks to fulfill its mission statement of “feeding, clothing, and supporting our neighbors with compassion and dignity.” They clearly accomplish all of that, and more.
Along with receiving Livingston’s direct deliveries, Bessie Green also benefits from LPI’s strong partnership with teachers Jennifer Mortensen and Tamara Gutierrez, co-chairwomen of the Volunteer Club at Jonathan Dayton High School in Springfield. Each year, Jonathan Dayton students collect hundreds of warm coats and winter accessories, which are delivered to Bessie Green and other distribution partners by LPI volunteers.
Here’s the Livingston connection to Jonathan Dayton: chiropractor Gary Hecht, a Livingston resident with offices in Springfield, also collects coats for LPI and introduced me to Jen Mortensen. He knew that Jen and her club collect coats and were seeking an appropriate organization for donation. She found it with Livingston Philanthropies.
Additionally, LPI volunteers visit Bessie Green’s soup kitchen often to distribute toiletries and cosmetics gift bags to the mostly homeless guests.
I want to be sure to mention the 100 dining room chairs donated by Nero’s Grille in Livingston. Sixty of the padded wooden chairs went to the Bessie Green Community. This donation facilitated a redesign of Bessie Green’s dining room seating from an institutional appearance to separate smaller table groupings, more like a restaurant. The 40 remaining chairs are being put to good use by the Reverend Michael Sykes and Minister Zena Sykes at United Missionary Baptist Church in East Orange.
I plan to focus on other LPI distribution partners in the coming months. To paraphrase broadcaster Paul ...
