Janie’s House
physically. “That touched me,” Tyler said. “So when I got out of there, I laid that all on Janie.”
About five years ago, Tyler’s management met with the heads of Youth Villages, which operates facilities and programs for children across the country.
“It’s not every day you get a call from a manager of a rock star who says he wants to meet you,” Youth Villages CEO Patrick Lawler said. “First of all, you think it’s one of your buddies screwing around with you.”
Their first meeting, Lawler said, Tyler talked for three hours about why this cause was important to him. He had done his homework on Youth Villages, Lawler said, and had no interest in being a spokesman for the organization.
“Steven wanted to be all-in,” Lawler said.
One of the girls living in the home now, a 14-year-old whom Youth Villages identified with just her first name of Jabrayia told the crowd she’s grateful for Tyler and the house because now she knows she’s not the only one going through the issues that have plagued her young life.
Nicole Fannin, the director of residential services for Youth Villages, relayed additional messages from the girls.
They told her to thank Tyler — “but don’t just say it in a regular way.”
They felt safe there, she said, in some cases for the first time. In her promise to relay their message, she quoted one girl directly: “It’s not often somebody like him cares about somebody like me.”
Reach Jennifer Pignolet at jennifer.pignolet@commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @Jenpignolet. for the schools would also come from other sources of revenue.
“To ask Kyle a basic math question without taking into consideration the totality of income from the city was an unfair question,” Roman said.
Cunningham did not answer a request for comment Friday.
Katherine Burgess covers county government and the suburbs. She can be reached at katherine.burgess@commercialappeal.com or followed on Twitter @kathsburgess.