It is time that we personally ask for your help. In September 2018, the majority of the Alliance for Safe Kids’ (ASK) funding will be expiring and in order to ensure our future in the Yorktown community, we are asking for your generosity and support.
Every year since 2006, ASK has been the recipient of a $125,000 Drug Free Communities (DFC) grant. On October 1, 2017, ASK will be receiving our last installment of our 10-year, $125,000 per year grant as the term period has expired. Over the past two years, we have been searching for replacement funds and have been able to secure small grants and funding. Unfortunately, there are no available grants of this size to keep our organization moving forward into the future.
We are very grateful for the deep and powerful commitment that you have in ensuring our children have a safe and caring environment to grow up in. Without the support of community members like you, we will be unable to fund our critical programs, including:
Save A Life: A program designed to inform and empower high school students and adults to become community allies and first responders to support teens and families in crisis. Save A Life is one of ASK’s leading programs which has directly touched the lives of over 3,000 community members.
Prescription Drug Awareness: As of July 11, 2017, ASK’s Prescription Drug Disposal Unit has collected and disposed of 2,834 pounds of drugs – that’s an average of 46 pounds per month since it was installed in May 2012!
Community Service: Over the past 12 months, ASK has had 595 volunteers donate 4,282.5 hours of their time at different programs, initiatives and community events.
Youth Court: Youth Court is a voluntary alternative to Family Court and the criminal justice system. It is organized and run by teens, adjudicating real misdemeanor cases involving other teens with the goal of reducing juvenile delinquency. The legal and binding procedure determines a fair sentence in the form of community service hours for the youth offender. To date, 260 students have graduated from the program.
Drug and Alcohol Prevention: Every two years, ASK distributes a Prevention Needs Assessment Survey to 8th, 10th, and 12th graders in Yorktown and Lakeland. The chart on the right represents the results of 10th graders responding to their substance use in the past 30 days, reflecting a significant decline in use from 2011 to 2015.
We hope that you value the impact that ASK has had in our community – your support can really make a difference in the lives of our youth.
“ASK has been such an incredibly positive influence on my life. I like to say that I ‘grew up with ASK’ because I began volunteering when I was 10 years old! Being involved with ASK from an early age has fostered the individual that I am today. ASK created an environment that was open, non-judgmental, and honest; with an organization like ASK’s support, I remained alcohol and drug free during high school, and I plan to continue along that path, bringing the knowledge and tools I have acquired from ASK with me to college this fall.” Lauren Gammer, Yorktown High School ‘17
The action you take today will help determine the future of ASK, and our future of educating and empowering community members to make healthy decisions
The year ahead is crucial to our efforts, and that is why we are counting on your support today. Please send any gift you can afford to help us to continue to positively influence the lives of teens, like Lauren. Thank you.