CINspirational People
A Night of CINspiration
Thank you so much to my speakers Kilee Brookbank and Vickie Mertz, and to everyone who attended my September A Night of CINspiration for making this another very special night. Below is a link to the photo album. Please click on the image to begin viewing the photos. Hope to see you at another upcoming event!
Bobby, You Just Made My Day!
On the other end of the phone, I hear “Lisa! You just made my day!”
It is the kind of welcome that I have come to expect when I call my long time friend, Bobby Harrison; and pretty high up there on my list of reasons why I value our friendship. This is not only the way in which Bobby approaches our relationship, I have a pretty good indication it is how he sees all of his life, and the people who are part of it.
One could say he has a knack for being at the right place at the right time. But that would not give credit to where credit is due. People like to work with Bobby, and just be in his presence, because he has so many outstanding qualities. In his personal and professional relationships, he exudes genuine integrity and a sense of caring about the welfare of others. He has a rare ability for spontaneously coming up with jackpot ideas for creating impact. And his positive outlook is infectious.
Among those for whom he has created outreach programs include NBA player Tyrone Hill’s Celebrity Basketball Classic and Stedman Graham’s Athletes Against Drugs Program. He has created a statewide HIV/AIDS minority advertising campaign and created a video for Dial Corporation’s 75th anniversary of their flagship brand, Dial soap. His long list of clients (past and present) has included Procter & Gamble, Macy’s, Boy Scouts, YMCA, Honda, and Stedman Graham. And, for the past 23 years Bobby has served as creative director for the Macy’s Music Festival, working with industry greats such as Ray Charles and Aretha Franklin.
Really, this only scratches the surface of Bobby’s achievements. He is an accomplished musician who, many years back, was in a band that opened for the Jackson Five and the Commodores. He is an artist who draws and paints, and attended the Cincinnati Art Academy. Currently he is pumped about his idea and project that is quickly gaining momentum. It is about building interest in music among school children. Bobby and his team have been presenting it to organizations, businesses and educational institutions. Every time we talk, more organizations are stepping up to become involved. You will be hearing more about it soon.
I look up to Bobby, president of The Harrison Group, as a creative genius who has no fear of looking adversity in the face and saying, “You will not get in my way.” For my dear friend, that foe is non-hodgkins lymphoma. It is something that lives in his body permanently and nearly took Bobby’s life. It has changed his perspective and given him renewed incentive to appreciate everything with stamina and vigor.
Bobby told me his story one day over lunch. It came on suddenly. One day he began limping. Three days later his leg was becoming numb. He drove himself to the emergency room and had to crawl on the ground from the parking lot. The physicians told him he probably pulled his hamstring running, gave him food and crutches and sent him to his own doctor, who, after a five minute exam sent Bobby back to the emergency room. It ended up being the result of a massive blood clot that stopped six inches from his heart. During that ten day hospital stay they found out the underlying reason. Bobby experienced an intense ringing in his head like nothing he could even describe, and he was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer in his bones. It was the one time in his life that Bobby contemplated suicide.
“But I was lying there and couldn’t get up to go to the bathroom. And I looked out the window and saw birds landing on ledges and realized ‘that is life’. I realized I want to be that bird and be able to fly anywhere. It changed everything. I decided I don’t want to be around negative people any more. I don’t want to have any more arguments. I want to have a good time in life. I never want to live with regret,” he said.
These days Bobby is the one to lift others up. When he gets his chemo treatments, he is the one to make others smile and forget for a little while of the unpleasantness of the moment. When friends are going through difficulty, despite his crazy busy schedule with deadlines and meetings, he is a present spirit with encouragement.
He is an incredible human being who makes the world brighter by being in it. I, for one, am better for having him around.
New Life Furniture Is Her Calling
Holly Young walks to a map of Greater Cincinnati hanging on the wall behind a front desk where there are many hundreds of blue and red dots, so densely populated as to obliterate entire blocks, even neighborhoods. The blue dots represent homes were lasting memories were created on or around furnishings that are no longer needed. These are the places where New Life Furniture Bank begins the process of ending the cycle of 
homelessness one individual, one parent, one family at a time. The red dots on that map represent all of the dwellings where that donated furniture has found a ‘new life,’ amidst a family who has moved into a place to call home with often nothing but the clothes on their backs.
Since that day ten years ago when a Teresa, mother of three children, stayed overnight at Holly’s church through the Interfaith Hospitality Network, Holly’s passion and mission in life has exploded from seeking out three mattresses so that Teresa’s children would not have to sleep on mattresses their mother pulled from a dumpster into a nonprofit the more than 1000 volunteers, two delivery trucks, five employees, and such a huge stock of donated furnishings that they have outgrown their 5000 sq ft space and are searching for 20,000 sq ft of storage. New Life Furniture has relationships with 18 homeless shelters and agencies, as well as over 60 places of worship. In 2015 alone, it has provided furniture and housewares to 1424 people including 752 children. The organization is faith based, having originated from the generous outpouring of support from Holly’s church; however, it helps people of all religions and backgrounds.
In addition to furniture, every family receives a package of dishes and household items, a welcome home bag with personal care items, cleaning supplies and hangers. Whenever beds are delivered, they go with blankets, sheets and pillow cases. And, volunteers build dining room tables for families so they have a place to congregate around and share experiences of their day.
Holly is quick to point out that 85% of those who move into a dwelling without furnishings find themselves back on the streets. That number isn’t acceptable to this mother who has always, from a child, been sensitive to those less fortunate. “I am that child who kept asking my parents, why aren’t we picking that person up. I knew it was my calling,” she told me. “I worked the corporate world but I just knew my heart was in serving the homeless. I am the one who goes to a ball game and packs four lunches to feed people. I was the person who would stop and make sure people knew where to find shelters.”
In Holly’s words:
“So many of the people we have helped have touched me in deep, very personal ways. I have lots of stories in my mind from when I did the deliveries myself. I remember Moses well. We walked into his very small apartment and all we saw was one chair. Moses was smiling ear to ear. He was 78 yrs old and walking with a walker. With each piece we carried in he just giggled, and said. ‘Is that for me?’ And I said, ‘of course it is.’ I peeked into his empty bedroom and noticed a Veterans ball cap that had Vietnam on it. ‘OMgosh,’ I said. ‘Moses are you a veteran? My dad also served in Vietnam and retired as a colonel.’ He proceeded to share a bit of his story. He served the same time my father did…….and how in the 
world did this happen to Moses? How did he become homeless and in such need?
We proceeded to fill his empty apartment and make it a home…..His home. We were so grateful we get to serve a man who served us, a man who fought for our freedom. He teared up many times and I just hugged him tightly and cried with him. I thanked him for serving his country. He said he didn’t know he deserved all this stuff, and I assured him he did deserve it. We left his place with such a full heart.
Our goal is to always do this from a place of dignity. Our delivery people are trained to be compassionate and we send follow up cards to everyone letting them know we are thinking about them.
This work has been such a blessing for me. Never did I dream this would grow so big. Now funders and donors are coming to us. We have way outgrown this space. We are at a place now where I can step back. God has told me it is time to go on to other things. Actually he told me that two years ago but I kept going. Dana Saxton is our new executive director but I will always still be involved.”
If you would like to help, please reach out to New Life. They are especially in need of mattresses.
Two Cincinnati Heroes Celebrated
Last week, I got to meet someone who in my book is a true hero. You may have heard about a horrific explosion this past June in an Oakley apartment building that killed a mother and her son. The reason the rest of the residents lived to talk about it is because of a brave young couple, who, after making it to safety, risked their lives to go back into that inferno to makes sure everyone else made it out alive too. Mastafa ran through the 12-unit building banging on doors, yelling, ‘FIRE!’. His wife helped a 79 year old woman out of her basement patio by pulling her over the 
metal railing. He carried down an older woman in a second floor apartment, and pulled two men who were also living in lower level apartments out to safety. Those two men are roommates Mike and Vince, who are living on their own with support from LADD – Living Arrangements for the Developmentally Disabled. (LADD has since helped Mike and Vince find and move into a new apartment.) I was fighting a lump in my throat after meeting Mostafa. He is such a kind, gentle and upbeat man who refuses to see himself as a hero. “This was just humanity,” he told me.
Mastafa got to see Vince again at the LADD Taking Flight Awards and it so touched me to see their arms around each other. That embrace said it all.
I am thrilled that he and his wife will be joining us for A Night of CINspiration on Wednesday night so that we can celebrate that sense of humanity, for which Mostafa and his wife are beautiful examples, that breaks down those barriers of differences and brings us together human beings.
Ian Inspires Passion In Schools
It was after attending Holmes High School in Covington, graduating from Northern Kentucky University with a bachelor’s degree in radio and television, and working at ESPN that Ian Smith, founder and CEO of Skool Aid, realized he wasn’t following his passion. So, he took a part time job substitute teaching and began pursuing a master’s degree in special education. But, it turned out that wasn’t his thing either. Music (and fun), now THAT was Ian’s THING!
Ian developed a program he called Movement in Music, a class that incorporates the rhythmic sounds of Ian’s drum with physical fitness games to teach kids about good sportsmanship, teamwork, and other life skills. It was an idea that caught on. Soon he was being hired by schools from Pleasant Ridge to Kenton County. “Then I began thinking, if I am building relationships with all these districts, why not help other teaching artists have an opportunity too to pass along their passions to students?,” Ian told me.
Some five years later, his organization that he named Skool Aid includes 25 teachers presenting 28 different programs to area schools, mostly for afterschool programming. Skool-Aid is also contracted by LADD, Inc.’s Cincinnati ReelAbilities Film Festival to present ReelEducation in area schools, teaching children about appreciating and understanding differences.
Along the way Ian reconnected with a childhood friend, Jake Counts, who recently retired from professional wheelchair basketball. Together they began talking to classes and entire schools about disabilities and adaptive sports. Then they began incorporating a fun game of Jake’s sport into their program.They gathered parts to build wheelchairs so they could teach kids about wheelchair basketball, and then realized, Cincinnati offered no opportunities for young people who use wheelchairs to actually play and compete in the sport.
Ian and Jake began working with the Cincinnati Recreation Commission to create a team for adults called the Cincinnati Royals, and organized the Cincinnati Dragons team for children 14 and under(under the umbrella of the Greater Cincinnati Adaptive Sports Club). They are in the process of expanding to also have a junior varsity team.
In Ian’s Words
“One reason I am really passionate about this work because it is an opportunity to empower other teachers to work with kids, develop a class teaching what they are good at, and do that they are on earth to do. If I can supplement their income by their teaching kids their passion, then these educators are also influencing kids to identify their passion
Jake and my presentations open the eyes of kids who might not have anyone in their lives who has a disability. By seeing and getting to know Jake and how he is just like them in many ways, they come to realize that they can have commonalities with anyone who is different from themselves.”
