PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE for December, 2015

It’s been a very Happy Year, 2015!  Can’t wait for more action in 2016!

As you know, I wrapped on Black Friday and pulled in $67.10 from the crowd at B & N.  Last week on Christmas Eve, Kathy Freeman, Maureen Martin and her friend, Cynthia Lehman, came to join me wrap!  What fun, but the most fun was counting the money raised….$299.66!!!  Yahooo…for a total of $366.76.  We met a lot of cool people who were glad to give.

Also last week Tuesday, I met with Sharan Sturdavant from Cedar Springs, our first recipient of our Hear For Good hearing aids.  DHHS’s Nancy Cluley interviewed her as a candidate for our program and she was ecstatic to know that someone finally could help her.  She has had hearing loss for most of her life along with a speech impediment.  She found help for her speech but she still needed hearing aids.  She has been tested by three different audiologists in hopes that someone, or some way, she could get help.

Today, I received a voice mail from her husband, Eric, who is just as excited about the hearing aids as she is!  I called back and reached Eric.  He handed the phone to Sharan and told me her fittings would be tomorrow at Kaczmarski Hearing Center!  It only took one week to get the reconditioned hearing aids to her with her specific needs.  Starkey is an amazing company!

Kaczmarski is a terrific company as well.  They are the only independent audiology center in West Michigan.  Beckie Kaczmarski was more than willing to give her time, her employee’s time and talent to make this a dream come true at Christmas for someone who has been waiting so long for someone to come forward.

We are the ones who have made a new life for Sharan.  I’m so proud that we can all, collectively, with agency and audiologists’, support to make a difference.

I hope your dreams come true, too, in 2016.

Martha