Bridging the wealth gap to feed strangers
I’ve typed these words too many times, for too many years: Fairfield County has one of the widest wealth gaps in the nation.
This is one way to cross that bridge.
Two months ago, I got a call from a reader who wanted to make sure her donation to the new HelpA-Neighbor fund had not been lost. I told her we would confirm, and thanked her for being thoughtful enough to contribute. She earnestly replied that she just wanted to try to help in these days of uncertainty.
I called Bill Brucker from Family Centers and he was able to retrieve the check within 90 minutes so we could put her mind at ease.
It turned out she was the one putting minds at ease.
The check was for $10,000. She asked to remain anonymous, but deserves to know the difference she made in the lives of strangers.
This fund emulates the Giving Fund that has appeared in the Stamford Advocate and Greenwich Time for 37 years during the holiday season. We annually collect cases from Family Centers and Person-to-Person about residents in need and readers reliably respond.
The Help-A-Neighbor campaign also draws submissions from Domus and Building One Community. The clients of these four nonprofits are the people on the other side of that financial chasm.
Most of the requests — which come from social workers on behalf of unsuspecting clients — are in the $250-$500 range. Which means that single donation buoyed more than 20 individuals or families.
Just as with our mystery donor, we shield the identities of the recipients. Many of these people were thrust into crisis as the pandemic became a thief robbing them of their livelihoods.
The Velásquez family volunteered to share their story.
“We are happy to do this because we are grateful,” Mónica says.
Mónica’s work cleaning homes ended as soon as social distancing began in March. Amilcar, a handyman, had to stop working shortly after. They were suddenly isolated in their Cove home with their sixth-grade daughter, Adelaida, with no money coming in. Monica and Amilcar have lived in Stamford for 20 years, and been together for 15. The pandemic put them in peril overnight.
“I was afraid of losing the roof,” Mónica says. She immediately suffered from anxiety attacks and insomnia. They applied for unemployment, “but we are still waiting for that.”
We are joined in our conversation by Brucker and Raquel Martinez, a mental health clinician for Family Centers. Martinez translates the couple’s native Spanish when they can’t summon the right words in English, but it’s easy to understand their most urgent need in those first weeks: “La comida.”
Martinez applied for Help a Neighbor funds to help feed the family. She surprised them one day with a check for $500.
“It was like opening an empty refrigerator and saying ‘Oh my God, we have food,’ ” Amilcar recalls of the gift.
Mónica and Amilcar both shake their hands gravely and repeat the same three-word phrase, with mirror pauses before repeating them. If not for the help, “I don’t know ... I don’t know.”
The check was for $10,000. She asked to remain anonymous, but deserves to know the difference she made in the lives of strangers.
They immediately went to Costco for essentials. Milk, bread, eggs. When readers send in donations, Brucker hustles to get checks out immediately.
“A lot of my families don’t have (immigration) papers, so they can’t even apply for unemployment,” Martinez points out, adding that those clients are not eligible for stimulus checks. “A couple of families didn’t even have money to buy food for newborns.”
Amilcar, Mónica and Adelaida mostly stayed home “watching people through the window.” Without cable television, they leaned on a few movies.
“Sometimes we would get movies and I would make us watch it over and over and over again,” Adelaida says, pointing to the animated “The Book of Life” as an example.
Martinez also provided emotional counseling to the Velásquez family. Brucker calls Martinez “a
rock star.” He gets no argument.
“Without her ... I don’t know. I think we would be depressed by now,” Mónica says.
She addresses Martinez directly: “Thank you so much for everything you did. I’m not going to get tired of saying how grateful I am.”
They have started to work again, as their own clients are tentatively opening doors from the spring hibernation. Like everyone else, Monica is “trying to stay positive that things are getting better.”
But the pandemic underscored a truth that staff at Family Centers, Person-to-Person, Domus and Building One have always known. It’s become a cliché to say the clients at agencies like these are vulnerable to a single financial disaster.
“This was that financial disaster,” Brucker says. After our Zoom call late Friday afternoon, Brucker and I compared notes on brief conversations each of us had with the woman who donated $10,000. She crossed the bridge of the wealth gap to help strangers. So did many other readers. The fund has raised more than $56,000, fulfilling 83 of the 120 cases we’ve published. The campaign is wrapping up, but we’re still hoping to fulfill the remaining requests.
Brucker recalled our mystery donor’s modest, but potent words.
“I just wanted to make sure people are taken care of.”