charity/volunteer

The Lincoln METCO Coordinating Committee has published a new book about the hundreds of donations of furniture, antiques, and artwork they sold to help fund activities for students year in and year out.

Downsize for Diversity: How We Raised $122,000 with a Pickup Truck and a Little Help from Our Friends tells the story of how an unexpected donation of 60 porcelain dolls led to the idea of selling them and other donated items to pay for METCO summer camp scholarships. The seed was a fundraising brainstorming session involving the book’s co-authors, MCC fundraising chair Joanna Schmergel and Lincoln METCO Director and AIDE Coordinator Marika Hamilton. (Full disclosure: Lincoln Squirrel Editor Alice Waugh designed and edited Downsize for Diversity but will not earn money from sales of the book; all proceeds benefit the Lincoln MCC.)

“As we pivoted from porcelain dolls to American Girl Dolls to estate sale items, we started to slowly realize the huge opportunity with people who were downsizing for different reasons at different phases of life,” Schmergel said. “We realized we could keep going and get to our goal of $100,000, which would be enough to start a policy-governed investment fund to generate school-year operations funds.”

Over the course of four years, dozens of volunteers learned how to transport, fix up, price, and list items for sale (see photo gallery below). The MCC eventually surpassed their fundraising goal by racking up more than $122,000 in the end. But they haven’t stopped collecting and selling donations; the focus has shifted to artworks only, and the operation is now called “Downsize for Diversity ART” (Anti-Racist Together) and has already raised another $10,000.

The book is packed with photos, tips, and humorous anecdotes about the surprising variety of things that passed from the hands of donors to volunteers to new owners. Those items ran the gamut from American Girl dolls to Southeast Asian furniture, clocks, oil paintings, a computer server cabinet, a canoe, christening gowns — and even a century-old proctoscope complete with case and instructions.

Every item has a history, some of which is included in the book. “People want to give their valuable items to a good cause, but they also want to tell the stories that go along with them,” she said. “We then pass those stories on to the buyers who purchase their treasures and want to hear those stories.”

“We learned that there is passionate support in the greater Boston area for anti-racism, diversity, equity, and inclusion,” Schmergel said. “Almost every single donor and many buyers had a story to tell about how the METCO program touched them as a host parent, close friend to a METCO-enrolled student, coach, or teacher.”

“I have been amazed at the generosity of so many people all over. During times where we were dealing with a dual pandemic, folks were still showing love but wanting to donate dolls, furniture, art, and much more,” Hamilton said, who also had high praise for her co-author. 

“It’s been most rewarding to see Joanna’s passion with Downsize for Diversity. She’s been full throttle since I met her, and our connection and ideas have been magical from the time I met her. Her battery pack never runs low and even if it does, she still has the energy of 100 people. She is one of the most selfless people I know and has unconditionally worked to pull in volunteers and open the doors to her home to keep D for D growing. The benefit has been that students are able to have access to opportunities that they might not otherwise have been afforded.”

For anyone who’s looking to raise money for their local METCO program or any nonprofit, “my advice would be to read our book and let it trigger your own ideas. You can take pieces and fragments from the book and use them to go after the low-hanging fruit,” she said.

Hamilton’s advice? “Your ‘why’ must be very clear because when times feel tough, that’s what will continue to drive your work. I’d also say think big, but it’s OK to start small, even if you start with a goal to raise $1,000. It’s not the dollar amount when you start, but the blueprint and plan you use. And if you’re in need of a plan, purchase our book so you don’t have to grow a second brain! Sharing is caring,” she said with a laugh.

Look inside Downsize for Diversity and buy now from BookBaby.com to maximize MCC’s royalties, or order on Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble.com. All income from sales of the book will go to the Lincoln MCC.

A sign over a doorway in the apartment that Lincolnites helped a Sudanese woman rent and decorate.

By Maureen Belt

Everyone’s familiar with the saying “It takes a village to raise a child,” but a local organization is putting a new spin on it.

“It takes a village to resettle a family in Massachusetts,” said Susan Winship, LICSW, who co-founded the South Sudanese Enrichment for Families in 2004, a nonprofit that provides grants to house, educate, and enrich survivors of the “Lost Boys” diaspora and their families. 

The Lost Boys was a humanitarian crisis caused by the Sudanese civil war. More than 20,000 children, most of them boys around eight years old, were driven from their homes and half of them perished. The survivors traversed barefoot for more than 1,000 miles to the safety of Kenya and have since been resettled throughout the world.

Some took refuge in the United States and organizations such as the SSEF sprouted up to provide for their basic needs. Besides helping the children acclimate to the United States, the organization assists with everything from employment and technical skills, summer camp and emergency funding. The program, Winship said, was chugging along beautifully, assisting scores of refugees to comfortably reside in the U.S. — until the housing hit.

Rents in Massachusetts skyrocketed last year. Prospective tenants for a once-affordable bare-minimum two-bedroom unit in Massachusetts were asked to shell out nearly twice the national average, according to the Massachusetts Association of Realtors. Lofty salaries offered by local technology and biomedical companies fueled the surge and the ability of landlords to discard applications with even the hint of a blemish. Add a prospective tenant with multiple children and a not-so-great credit score, “and you can just hang it up,” said Winship. 

Winship was referring to Mary, a single mother of three school-aged children who became SSEF’s latest success story after clearing the housing hurdle. Mary, whose last name is being withheld because she left a situation where she felt unsafe, is a Sudanese refugee who dreamed of becoming a doctor. She arrived poor in Illinois in the mid-aughts and married another refugee. The marriage was tumultuous and ended. Last year, Mary and the children took further refuge with relatives in Boston. That shelter was short-lived, as one of the relatives expected Mary and the children to live in an unheated attic.

Once on SSEF’s radar, Winship immediately sought safe housing for Mary. Having done this work multiple times, she knew there would be correspondence with landlords, appointments for apartment showings, and detailed applications to fill out, but she presumed Mary and her family would be nicely settled in a month or so. But the housing crisis nearly upended Winship’s plans. Eventually, the situation prompted the SSEF to develop a program focused solely on navigating the housing issue. The plan had three parts:

• A housing consultant (hired in late 2021)
• A program encouraging volunteers to co-sign leases for prospective low-income tenants, especially those with weak credit scores
• A fundraising project where housing recipients embroider dinner napkins at home that are sold through SSEF — an effort that will being an estimated $5,000 a year in additional funds for each family. 

“We are responding to a need, and this is a very big need,” said Winship.

The consultant’s research revealed what Winship had suspected: “Lots and lots of people were housing insecure.” And lots and lots of people would be needed to get through it, hence the “village” reference.

True to Lincoln’s reputation for helping others, more than a dozen residents came to Mary’s aid. Within a few months, the volunteers helped her secure a home and ensured her children would not have to change schools again. They also found suitable furnishings and embellishments such as curtains, posters, shelves and even a refrigerator stocked with fresh food, converting the housing unit into a home. 

But it wasn’t easy.

“It’s not just a bad credit score,” said “Sydney,” a Lincoln resident who volunteered to cosign Mary’s lease and also requested anonymity. “No one really wants to rent to a family that large. Landlords are not allowed to discriminate on the basis of children, but they do, and there’s no way to hold them accountable. The number of kids Mary has seems to be unappealing to most landlords, not to mention she’s a single mom and a Black mom.”

There were other obstructions, she said. Most housing applications are done online, and Mary has few technical skills and very limited reading skills. This is not uncommon among Sudanese refugees, as traditionally the culture relies on oral rather than written communication. Sydney assisted with much of the online work and the women soon found themselves consumed with applications waiting to be filled out. Each unit sought for Mary required a separate application and references. “We applied to so many, and there is no common app,” Sydney said. 

Mary’s income created another obstacle. Employed by an online retailer, she earns $37,000 a year and receives another $10,000 in government assistance. Support from her former spouse disappeared when he quit his job. 

“No one would rent to her,” said Winship. “Landlords want your gross income to be three times your rent.”

Mary could not clear that requirement on her own. Instead, she began falling through bureaucratic cracks. She made too much money to qualify for affordable housing, but she wasn’t poor enough for emergency housing. Then there was her unfortunate credit score, her need for child care while she worked, and other fluctuating expenses such as food and utilities. The uphill task became ever more daunting.

Still, much like the Lost Boys themselves, the Lincoln volunteers soldiered on, and perseverance paid off. A real estate agent in Arlington with a personal connection to the Lost Boys took kindly to Mary. “She said, ‘I’ll help you find a place.’ And, she did,” Sydney recalled. 

Through her networking, the agent connected with the sympathetic landlord of a three-bedroom apartment in Salem. But even after agreeing to lower the rent below market value, however, Mary still did not qualify on her own. Her options narrowed down to the family living out of her car or becoming homeless.

“I said, ‘Forget it, that’s not going to happen,’” Sydney said, and cosigned on the dotted line. 

Mary and her children moved into their new home on February 1. Her Lincoln helpers ensured every room was not only furnished but nicely decorated. The kitchen was stocked with cookware and dishes.

“She was so happy. This family had been in transition for nearly two years,” said an exuberant Winship. “Now they have beds and bedrooms. Before that, it wasn’t like that at all.”

Sydney admits to being nervous about cosigning, especially as they had only known Mary a short time. But they have no regrets. “I feel very happy that I did it,’ they said. “It’s especially important for the kids, for them to have a home. It’s very gratifying in that way.” 

Other organizations that helped SSEF fund Mary’s journey to safety include:

• Jewish Family and Children’s Services
• Vincent DePaul Society of Salem
• Family Promise of the North Shore
• RAFT (Residential Assistance for Families in Transition)
• Women’s Fund