Build the Path this #GivingTuesday

Celebrate #GivingTuesday, the global day of giving on November 28th by hosting a mini-fundraiser on Facebook to support the work of R CITY! This #GivingTuesday the Gates Foundation is teaming up with Facebook to boost the impact of charitable giving to approved non-profits.

Here are some details from the Facebook giving website!

• Timing: Donations to nonprofits made through Facebook’s charitable giving tools on November 28th will be matched up to $50,000 per nonprofit or $1,000 per fundraiser or donate button, until the $2 million in matching funds run out. The match will begin at 8AM EST (5AM PST).
• Fees: Facebook is also waiving processing fees for every donation made to nonprofits on #GivingTuesday. Fees will be waived for all of #GivingTuesday, regardless of when the match runs out.

What that means for us:

• Supporters interested in giving to R CITY this Holiday Season can double their gifts (up to $1,000) by donating EARLY on November, 28th through a Facebook donate button.
• Supporters can invite their friends to give to R CITY by hosting an online fundraiser through Facebook.

Want to get involved?

Hosting a fundraiser on Facebook only takes 3 easy steps!
**Note: Anyone can do this anytime- not just on #GivingTuesday

Questions? 

Contact Michelle Johnson, Communications Director: michelle.johnson@rcitycdc.org

Kenneth Hartung Memorial

Celebrating the life and legacy of Ken Hartung, R CITY is thankful to receive memorial gifts in his honor. Directed by Ken’s granddaughter Elizabeth, R CITY seeks to glorify God by building a path from cradle to career. The resilient youth served by R CITY are overcoming great adversity, including violence and economic hardship within their Chicago neighborhoods.

Ken entered the world of work at age 5, plowing the fields at his family’s farm in Kansas and working his way through college cleaning the stadium. R CITY is honoring his legacy of determination and grit by establishing a memorial fund within our youth apprenticeship program. Donations given in Ken’s honor will pay stipends (cost: $36,000 annually) and provide transportation (cost: $20,000) for R CITY youth ages 12-18 learning the career of tuckpointing, a masonry skill.

These stipends not only benefit the youth, but their families as well, often making a difference in times of crisis. Practicing their trade through community service, these youth provide free tuckpointing services to low-income homeowners–many widowed–who would otherwise have no means to repair their homes. Until transportation is available, the apprentices are walking significant distances to work sites each day–many after a long bus ride from school.

Gifts may be given online via debit/credit/EFT here or mailed to River City Community Development Center / P.O. Box 51468 / Chicago, IL 60651. Checks should be made to River City Community Development Center with memo to Hartung memorial. For information on donating stock or other types of gifts, please e-mail the directors.

Join us at Boathouse Cafe to Build the Path

2017 has been an exciting year at R CITY and we are delighted to invite you to join us at the Humboldt Park Boathouse Cafe for an evening to help us build the path for our youth to continue walking from cradle to career to the Glory of God.

Sunday, June 25,  4 PM- Cocktails  5 PM- Dinner

Come and CELEBRATE a beautiful year!

The 2016-17 school year brought over 130 children and youth through our after school enrichment programs.  Families were supported, youth were mentored, children were embraced into an incredible web of support- we are grateful to so many who made this happen.

Come and GIVE toward a beautiful future!

Beginning this summer we are thrilled to announce the expansion of R CITY with the addition of Harambee Chicago teen apprentices. As we build the path from cradle to career, our teens now have the exciting opportunity to learn the masonry skill of tuckpointing. Teens will earn an educational stipend while receiving real-world job experience by providing this costly service for our low-income neighbors in need.

Spring at R CITY

At R CITY, our hearts are very, very full, reflecting the abundance of the year we have had so far with our beloved young people in Humboldt Park. And it’s only April! Here are some key highlights from this year so far.

Ultimate Battle, which is R CITY’s how-much-HW-can-you-do-in-20-minutes competition, is now equipped with *prizes*.The “league leaders” in Homework Points, Helpfulness Assists, and Behavior Fouls are looking forward to their hard-earned field trip! Can you sense the excitement?

We added a new enrichment class–coding–and crowdfunded to purchase shiny new Chromebooks. We’re getting them all set up and ready to kick off Code Combat ASAP.

Large group sessions received a theatrical boost with a new skit series surrounding a troubled but lovable protagonist “Snake Eyes,” whose adventures have sparked sympathy and an eager crowd of fans. Among them are our music class students, who authored a song reflecting his encounters with the world’s darkness and light.

Finally, plenty of goofiness to go around.

Of course, we couldn’t have done all this without your support! At the beginning of this year, we set a goal of 100 new gifts of $30 monthly, and we’re over 1/3 of the way there! Use your resources or relationships to join us in Building the Path!

Quattro Development Builds the Path

One of the greatest joys of working at R CITY is to build relationships with our supporters and hear stories of why they choose to invest in our young people. The following conversation features Rob Walters from one of our business donors, Quattro Development.

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What does Quattro Development do? 

Quattro Development is a retail development company started in 2007 by Rob Walters and Mike Liyeos. We purchase well located properties across the country, construct free standing and multi-tenant retail buildings on the properties and lease them to national retailers such as Chipotle, Chick-Fil-A, Vitamin Shoppe, Mattress Firm, and Starbucks. We have developed over 60 properties in 17 states. Quattro Impact was set up as a vehicle for Quattro Development to invest a portion of its profits in organizations and people that Quattro’s founders wish to support.

Why support R CITY? What is your interest in the program? 

The investment started with a belief in Brandon Green and that God had called him to River City Community Church and that he would be used to build a bridge between the existing church and the neighborhood that the church was moving into.  As time has passed and I have met many of the kids that benefit from the R CITY programs my desire to support the organization has only deepened.  I acknowledge a group of amazing kids who are in need of love and support and I have seen how R CITY is uniquely situated to provide this.  My dream is that the kids who benefit from the programming will go on to be leaders and agents of change on their own rather than statistics.

Any words you have for other businesses not yet engaged? 

A relatively small investment can go a long way with R CITY because there is virtually no overhead.  An investment in R CITY is an investment in the mental, emotional, and spiritual life of great kids that are lacking many of the resources that many of us take for granted.

Anything else you want to add? 

I believe that if each neighborhood in the city had one or two R CITYs in it so many of the problems with crime, unemployment, and poverty would shift. As a business owner I benefit from what Chicago has to offer but also feel a responsibility to make the whole city “the best city in the world” and not just certain parts.  I believe that West Humboldt Park will be a better place because of R CITY.

Thank you again Quattro Development for building the path with R CITY! For more information on the great work Quattro Development is doing, visit www.quattrodevelopment.com

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To discover how your business can help build the path, e-mail our director.

Harmony Health Plan Builds the Path

On February 27, 2017,  WellCare Health Plans, Inc. on behalf of its subsidiary Harmony Health Plan, Inc., disbursed $18,000 in the form of 13 micro-grants to community-based organizations. These micro-grants will support nonprofit organizations that provide crucial social services around transportation, behavioral health services, and youth programming.

For a small, new community-based organization, micro-grants increase capacity for existing programs and create possibilities for new ideas and ventures. “Thanks to Harmony’s support, River City Community Development Center will now be able to provide the youth of West Humboldt Park with holistic after-school support to help set them on the path for a healthy and successful future,” said Elizabeth Galik, executive director at River City. “We are so grateful for Harmony’s investment in the incredible youth of our community and, by extension, the future of our city.”

Business Gifts Build the Path

With special thanks to Cambium Networks

As a nonprofit organization, R CITY only exists through the goodwill of others. We are so grateful for each individual, each church, each foundation that builds the path for our children to walk from cradle to career. While each gift is special and heart-warming, gifts from businesses have unique meaning, using hard-earned profits for the good of the next generation of Chicago’s workforce.

Beloved businesses supporting R CITY include:

AmazonSmile Foundation
Aon Foundation
Comprehensive Health Management
Kohl’s Department Stores
Minnesota Counseling
Quattro Impact, LLC
S & S Activewear

This month, the list was joined by Cambium Networks, a leading global provider of wireless broadband solutions that connect the unconnected. Their most recent blog post describes Cambium’s investment in R CITY and the youth of West Humboldt Park.

Our special thanks to Cambium Networks and our very faithful business donors. Thank you for all you provide on the path from cradle to career!

To discover how your business can help build the path, e-mail our director.

March Madness

As our mission says, we at R CITY continually seek to bring together the best of our city to build the path from cradle to career. Next month, we’re using March Madness as an excuse to party with some of our city’s best, our neighbors at Park Community Church – Logan Square. We can’t wait to open the River City doors wide for Pastor Jason Helveston and his crew to join our River Citizens for all the March Madness we can handle. Those big screens all around River City can do more than just lyrics, after all.

Tickets include an incredible lunch and halftime competitions with prizes and public accolades for the winners. Not only will party guests get to meet our neighborhood youth–fans of basketball both on-screen and off–but we’ll share a little bit about the vision at R CITY and how we can help build the path from cradle to career. Don’t worry, though: we won’t interrupt your game.  And just by coming you’re building the path, since all ticket proceeds will benefit R CITY.

Join us! Get your tickets here.