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Ministry offers help for food assistance applicants

By
Brigitta Burks
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A representative from Toledo Area Ministries’ Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) will be available to help clients fill out food assistance applications throughout April.

Three workers from the program operate a mobile unit that travels to food pantries and senior centers every month. Caseworker Glenna Berres estimates the unit helps about 100 people per month.

“We take the applications to the sites rather than have the people come Downtown,” Berres said. “There’s such a need out there and many of these people are the newly poor; they haven’t been through this before.”
Anyone who thinks they may qualify for SNAP or wants to fi nd out can visit the following locations:

✯ Zablocki Senior Center, 3015 Lagrange St., 10:45 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. April 2

✯ Providence Center, 1205 Broadway St., 2-3:30 p.m. April 3

✯ Zablocki Senior Center, 3015 Lagrange St., 9:30-11 a.m. April 5

✯ Oregon Center, 570 Bay Shore Road, Oregon, 10-11:30 a.m. April 9

✯ Eleanor Kahle Center, 1315 Hillcrest St., noon-1:30 p.m. April 10

✯ Providence Center, 1205 Broadway St., 2-3:30 p.m. April 10

✯ Mayores Center, 2 Aurora Gonzalez Dr., 10-11:30 a.m. April 11

✯ Blessed Sacrament, 4227 Bellevue Road, 7:30-11:30 a.m. April 12

✯ Wesley United Methodist, 2934 Stickney Ave., 9-10:30 a.m. April 14

✯ Kent Branch Library, 3101 Collingwood Blvd., 1-2:30 p.m. April 17

✯ Our Lady of Lourdes, 6149 Hill Ave., 10:30 a.m. to noon April 18

✯ Waterville Branch Library, 800 Michigan Ave., Waterville, 1-2:30 p.m. April 18

✯ Hunt Center, 2121 Garden Lake Pkwy., 12-1:30 p.m. April 19

✯ Maumee Center, 2430 S. Detroit Ave., 10-11:30 a.m. April 24

✯ Providence Center, 1205 Broadway St., 2-3:30 p.m. April 24

✯ Our Lady of Lourdes, 6149 Hill Ave, 10:30 a.m. to noon April 25

✯ Point Place Library, 2727 117th St., 1-2:30 p.m. April 26

To learn more, visit the website www.tamohio.org

Perrysburg bus riders express fear of rising fares, ADA compliance

By
Caitlin McGlade
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Now that Perrysburg voters have voted down their present means of public transportation, a number of residents dependent on those services are coming to terms with the reality that their traveling might soon grind to a halt.

At least 40 Wood and Lucas County residents packed Perrysburg City Council chambers March 21 for a special transportation meeting, some expressing worries about the future system and others asserting unwillingness to subsidize others’ transportation costs.

City Council members Todd Grayson, Maria Ermie and Tom Mackin joined representatives from the transportation consulting firm Clear View Strategies to ask citizens what they want out of a public transit system.

Some expressed interest in bus routes that lead to and from popular venues in Toledo.

“I’m a property owner; I’ve been paying taxes for 40 years and I absolutely do not want to pay taxes for you to go to the Mud Hens, for you to the go to the symphony and for you to go somewhere else,” said Denny Barrett, a Perrysburg resident who spoke during the meeting. “Get yourself there — that’s not something the taxpayers should be paying for.”

City officials aim to draft a new system that takes the place of the Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority (TARTA). Voters opted out of the service in the beginning of March. The city plans to budget about $800,000 for new service costs, which would take about 1.25 mil in property taxes to levy, Grayson said.

The cost depends on what type of services the city and the consulting firm decides on. The group has already taken rides on TARTA to experience how routes work and the next step is to meet with TARTA officials to take stock of rider needs. In coming weeks, they will send out surveys and look for feedback from various organizations and businesses and read previous transportation reports.

Ultimately, requests for proposals will invite private companies to bid for a contract that would last five years. The issue would appear on the November ballot and if voters approve the measure, services would have to start by January.

But Mackin spurred a brief, heated debate about whether the city has the authority to levy property taxes for public transportation. He said he has not yet received a definitive answer from his lawyers.

Both Ermie and Grayson argued that the law permits municipalities to levy taxes for services that aid the elderly and people with disabilities. Grayson said he would hear within a few days whether the city can legally levy property taxes in this case, so he questioned why it was necessary “stir the pudding.”

Ernie Brancheau, a consumer advocate for the disabled community, questioned just how much a new, private service would benefit people with disabilities. He is wheelchair-bound and uses TARTA at least 30 times a week. Because TARTA receives federal funding, it must follow Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) guidelines. Private businesses do not — one of the reasons Brancheau said he can never take a cab.

“It does really scare me; when you go private then you lose the federal backing and you lose your ADA designation, so a private contractor can do whatever they darn well please,” he said. “If you don’t have the federal oversight, if I have a problem, who am I going to call?”

Grayson and Lynn Colosi, the senior vice president of Clear View, said the city would require that the company that wins the bid follow ADA-like rules. If someone is discriminated against, they said, the individual could at first report it to the company and then report it to the city.

Grayson said he’s glad the federal government wouldn’t be able to touch the city’s transit deal.

“I don’t want their strings attached,” Grayson said. “I think that’s part of the goal here is to get out from underneath the 800-pound gorilla in the room.”

Gregory Symington, a Perrysburg resident, wasn’t convinced. He’s worried a switch to a private business will jack up the prices.

“When it comes down to public transportation, we have to subsidize this with our tax dollars because it’s public and they don’t have to make a profit,” he said.

Numerous other meeting attendees expressed the same concern. TARTA is affordable, many said, and they feared the new bus system would demand higher prices.

Grayson assured them that the goal is to keep bus fares from increasing over what riders pay now.

“The goal is not to recover costs, the goal is not to penalize riders, to make [citizens] pay $18 to go over to Levis,” Grayson said. “We understand this will be a heavy loss.”

Although TARTA runs on taxes collected last year to operate this year, the bus system will stop services to Perrysburg in October. Law requires the system to stick with a municipality for at least six months after voter rejection of the service is finalized.

TARTA pulls in about $1.5 million from Perrysburg from an annual levy. State Representative Randy Gardner (R), who presides over the 6th district, called the move “taxation without transportation” in a letter to James Gee, TARTA’s general manager.

Sandra Alden is a Perrysburg resident who commutes to North Toledo every day for work. She said she has a fixed income and TARTA gave her reliable and convenient transportation.

“This has caused a great imposition on me, as of the end of October, I will be buying a car, leaving a job or moving,” Alden said.

City code inspectors start ‘spring cleaning’

By
Caitlin McGlade
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Inspector Paula Kozlowski hangs a notice on the door of a house on Packard Road. Toledo Free Press photo by Diane Woodring.

A baby seat that once bounced and spun lay abandoned in the driveway. Jagged glass hunks sprawled across the concrete. A wooden shed sagged into the ground in the backyard, before a forest of twisted blades of grass and weed skeletons. Balled-up underwear rested among them. Gutted Pringles tubes belched out a few potato chip shards.

The front of the house on Packard Road, covered in light green siding, didn’t look too shabby but its roof tiles curled up like blackened orange peels.

This is just the kind of house the city wants to target, said Paula Kozlowski, a code inspector, as she marched up the steps and hung a yellow tag around the doorknob.

This day, March 21, 2012, marked the second day for the city’s new “Spring Sweeps” initiative. It’s a proactive way to alert homeowners if they are violating maintenance codes and offer them a variety of financial aid programs to make home improvements more affordable.

And, if a homeowner is in compliance, there are door hangers to praise him or her.

Bands of code inspectors will focus on one neighborhood and then move to the next, visiting areas deemed on “the tipping point.” These are places that are not entirely consumed by blight but may be in danger of sinking into disrepair. Or, as Mayor Mike Bell put it, places that are “right on the edge of being great.”

“We do get a lot of people who think we’re just out here to cause trouble,” Kozlowski said. That is one of the reasons why Chris Zervos, director of inspections, wanted to launch “Spring Sweeps.”

Up until March 20, the city has responded to maintenance code violations based on complaints, which total about 28,000 a year, he said. A code inspector will check out the property drawing complaints and if the owner is violating code, he or she will issue a letter to address the problem.

Typically, the homeowner has about 30 days to reply or ask for an appeal if changes are not financially feasible. If nothing is done, the city can take the homeowner to court, where the judge might impose fines ranging from $75 to $250. Continuous infractions can incur fines up to about $600, Zervos said. The bulk of the complaints flow in from the central city.
“It’s never been cheap and it’s never been easy to own property but it is the American dream,” Zervos said.

He and other city officials suspect that a lot of these homeowners are not aware of the financial assistance that could help them. Thus, the packets that code inspectors hang on door knobs include information about a Habitat for Humanity repair program that sends insulation specialists to provide blown-in insulation for attics. This is free for homeowners whose incomes qualify.

Other programs listed include a down payment assistance grant for first-time home-buyers within 80 percent of the area median income — meaning that the annual income for a family of four could not exceed $50,100. Toledo residents within that range also qualify for loans or grants designated to fix code violations such as leaky roofs, faulty furnaces or crumbling foundations. Code inspectors will conduct the sweep until June 20.

Starting off in the Library Village neighborhood, the crew will later move to Arlington/Burroughs, Secor Gardens, Oakdale/Ravine Park and North Toledo/Point Place areas.

After June 20, the program will continue into other neighborhoods. The neighborhood that Kozlowski canvassed on the morning of March 21 was in relatively good condition, she said. Th e row of homes along Packard Street, off Sylvania Avenue, only needed a few notes for poor upkeep.

Kozlowski was mostly looking for egregiously chipped paint, cracked foundations and junk in the lawn or overflowing on the porch — one house had stacks of mangled wicker chairs and cardboard boxes stuffed behind its low porch wall.

She tends to give homeowners with minor infractions the benefit of the doubt.

“I try to keep in mind how I would feel,” she said. “If you really wanted to, you could go to any house and find something wrong — but you can’t be too overzealous.”

Canning: Mandate tramples liberty

By
Toledo Free Press
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With the enactment of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate for “free” contraception coverage, religious liberty — the inherent natural right of every individual — has been trampled.

You’ve undoubtedly heard about the HHS mandate announced Jan. 20 that will require all insurance plans to provide coverage, at no cost to the subscriber, for:

✯ Abortion-inducing drugs

✯ Contraceptives

✯ Sterilization

✯ Patient education and counseling for women of reproductive age

When the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — aka ObamaCare — was passed in March 2010, the 2,700-page monstrosity was designed to have some provisions begin six months after the law’s passage. Then, piece by piece, more aspects of the law were rolled out, all of which have been burdensome, costly and confusing for employers who provide health plans to their employees.

The provision at issue now, defined in an August 2011 interim HHS ruling, required most new and renewing health plans to provide “preventive services” with no cost-sharing as of August 2012. The services were to include contraceptive coverage, but allowed some nonprofit religious employers the choice to refuse those services.

Then, on Jan. 20, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced a “new element” to the interim but soon to be final rule: Religious employers must also provide contraception coverage by August 2013.

Wow! Religious employers get a whole year beyond secular employers to abandon their moral consciences and obey the un-elected bureaucrats’ orders.

The breathtaking arrogance is illustrated in this quote from Sebelius on the new element: “I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services.”

In other words: Religious employers have one year to get over themselves and realize they are unenlightened and discriminating against women. Bottom line: Religious employers such as Catholic hospitals, Christian schools and faith-based pregnancy centers will have to provide and pay for the coverage of these services regardless of the violation to their moral conscience. I suppose we should be grateful there is an exemption for houses of worship, albeit an exemption that is quite possibly the narrowest exemption in federal law to date. Even these houses of worship will be forced to certify their exempt status via cumbersome paperwork submitted on the government’s timetable.

You may be thinking: Why all the fuss? Wasn’t this conflict over religious liberty and moral conscience resolved with President Obama’s accommodation to religious groups announced at a Feb. 10 news conference?

Don’t be deceived. There was no accommodation. The president announced he would force insurance companies (also an abuse of power) to provide contraceptives for “free,” thus “relieving” the burden on the conscience of religious employers.

The truth of the matter is the proposal:

1. Does not resolve the moral issue at the core of the matter. There is no such thing as “free” contraception. Insurance companies will increase premiums for religious groups and therefore shift the cost for the morally offensive services back to them.

2. Is unworkable for the religious groups and other employers who self-insure and are in essence both employer and insurer.

3. Was contradicted that same afternoon when the administration filed the final regulation as written in August. No changes were made.

As expected, on March 1 the Democrat-controlled Senate voted 51-48 to table the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act as amended to the Transportation appropriations bill by Sen. Roy Blunt, (R-Mo). An excerpt from Blunt’s statement reads: “The Obama Administration’s health care mandate is an egregious violation of our First Amendment rights. Unfortunately, this is only a glimpse of what Americans can expect as a result of President Obama’s government health care takeover.”

✯ Joan Canning is the owner of HR Advocate LLC, a Toledo-based human resource and management consulting business. Find more information at www.hradvocate.biz.

Pounds: Wheels on the bus

By
Tom Pounds
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When Tarzan swings through the jungle, he doesn’t let go of a vine until the next one is securely in hand. That’s the image that comes to mind as Perrysburg deals with its post-TARTA future.

Toledo Free Press took some heat a few weeks ago with an election summary comment that called Perrysburg’s opting out of TARTA service “a short-sighted decision that will have major ramifications for the people who depend on the bus service for transportation. Time will tell if the money the individuals save is worth the sacrifice to the community as a whole.”

A number of Perrysburg readers wrote to say we were the ones being short-sighted, and one wrote that “several years of research have gone into the efficiency and efficacy of the service received from TARTA and the options available to continue to provide public transportation to citizens who need it. Many meetings between the city and the provider have taken place, with unrealized promises of more timely and value-added service. For all these years of membership, the city has paid an inordinately high premium to TARTA in view of the limited ridership of its citizens.”

Toledo Free Press was invited to attend the March 21 public meeting about Perrysburg’s efforts to replace TARTA. While the respected city may have diligently researched its decision to ask voters whether to leave TARTA, it does not seem to have an option ready for people who depend on public transportation.

“I’m a property owner; I’ve been paying taxes for 40 years and I absolutely do not want to pay taxes for you to go to the Mud Hens, for you to go to the symphony and for you to go somewhere else,” said Denny Barrett, a Perrysburg resident who spoke during the meeting. “Get yourself there — that’s not something the taxpayers should be paying for.”

It is fair to wonder whether Barrett has considered that the system works both ways; the same buses that take people to Toledo also bring people to Levis Commons and other shopping destinations in Perrysburg.

Barrett and other Perrysburg residents may be subject to a property tax levy to replace TARTA (although the legality of that may be challenged), which may save residents money but is going to be a source of concern until those who use the service know more.

There were several questions raised at the meeting about service quality, cost and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

It seems odd that Perrysburg would spend so much time and energy preparing to let go of the vine that is TARTA without having a clear plan for a smooth transition to the next vine. It is one thing to negotiate with a private company that isn’t sure if it will face competition with a service like TARTA, but with that competition factor removed, Perrysburg may not find itself in such a favorable bargaining decision.

We were prepared to apologize for mischaracterizing Perrysburg’s decision to leave TARTA as “short-sighted,” but nothing at the March 21 meeting convinced anyone that the next transportation vine is in sight, much less in hand.

✯ Thomas F. Pounds is president and publisher of Toledo Free Press and Toledo Free Press Star.

Rathbun: How not to invest in precious metals

By
Gary Rathbun
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In part two of this series, I will look at some ways not to invest in precious metals.

That is not to say any of the following are bad investments, they’re not, just that there are better ways to invest in metals if you are going for an inflation hedge and as insurance against really bad things happening in the economy.

One of the worst methods of investing in precious metals is through rare coins or numismatics. When you purchase a numismatic gold coin, say a 1929 double eagle, you are paying for not only the gold content but also the rarity and the grade or condition of the coin. Now, on a couple of fronts we can objectively evaluate the coin.

We know how many were struck and how many are known to exist today. So it is fairly easy to figure out the rarity. The 1929 Saint-Gaudens double eagle had 1.7 million minted. Most of the double eagles were returned to the mint and melted down. Some, however, were unofficially saved by treasury employees.

Estimates of the quantities saved range from a few dozen to several hundred thousand, depending on the date. To say the least, these specimens are rare and very few have come up for auction in the past couple of decades. The problem with using this coin as a store of value, meaning the gold content, is that as a collectible it is worth a lot more.

From one standpoint of investing this may be a good thing, but from the standpoint that you want to have something of value you can exchange for food or shelter, it is a very bad way of investing in gold. If it gets to the point of bartering for food and medicine, the rarity of the coin will mean nothing.

Secondly, the numismatic value of a coin is heavily weighted on the grade or the condition. Ratings range from MS (mint state) 1 to MS 70. An MS 70 coin is perfect and usually has never been touched by human hands without gloves. A coin that is MS 1 is usually a glob of metal and is not good for anything but melt-down value.

The difficulty with grading is that it is very subjective. I knew a dealer that would
purchase coins and pay a company to recertify them at a higher grade. The difference in price between an MS 60 and an MS 65 can be exponential. So grading is very critical and it doesn’t take much to lower the grade of a coin. A fingerprint left by someone not wearing gloves can lower the grade and the value several thousand dollars. So as a store of value and an inflation hedge, numismatic coins are not the way to prepare for a difficult economy.

Now, all of that being said, I do collect coins, have for most of my life and enjoy it very much as a hobby, but not so much as an investment against economic upheaval.

It is very important that when you look at investing in precious metals you know what you are buying and why. Many of the firms that advertise on the Internet do kind of a bait and switch.

I had a person come to me saying they invested in gold but what they had really purchased were rare coins; in the time gold went from $800 an ounce to $1,400 an ounce she lost more than $100,000 because the numismatic value decreased.

Actually, it didn’t decrease; the company that sold them to her marked it up so much on the purchase that the redemption value was below what she paid.

Next time we will discuss investing in mining companies and how to prevent yourself from being disappointed.

✯ Gary L. Rathbun is the president and CEO of Private Wealth Consultants, LTD. He can be heard every day at 4:06 p.m. on “After the Bell with Brian Wilson and the Afternoon Drive” and every Wednesday and Thursday at 6 p.m. throughout northern Ohio on “Eye on Your Money.”

He can be reached at (419) 842-0334 or email him at garyrathbun@ privatewealthconsultants.com.

Ready U session to cover summer weather safety

By
Jeff
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One downside to the unseasonably warm weather area residents have been enjoying lately is an unseasonably early start to severe weather season, said local weatherman “Blizzard Bill” Spencer.

“Here it is the middle of March when we should be talking about more cold and snow and instead we’re talking thunderstorms and May temperatures,” Spencer said. “When you’re talking about 20 degrees above normal and a jet stream farther north, we’ve already seen signs it could be a very busy season for severe weather.”

The 13abc meteorologist will discuss summer weather safety during an upcoming Ready U presentation. The free, hour-long session will start at 7 p.m. March 26 at the Main Library, 325 N. Michigan St., in Downtown Toledo.

Ready U, a yearlong series presented by the Red Cross of Greater Toledo and the Lucas County Emergency Management Agency, is designed to educate the public and prepare individuals and families for potential emergencies in Northwest Ohio.

Tornadoes — such as the fatal 2010 storms that destroyed Lake High School and the recent fatal storms in southern Ohio on March 2 — are the weather event most people think of when they think of severe summer weather, but hail, lightning and thunderstorms can also be dangerous, Spencer said.

“Everyone is always concerned about tornadoes, but you can get 100 mph winds out of thunderstorms, hail causes a lot of property damage and lightning on a soccer fi eld or in the pool can and does cause fatalities,” Spencer said.

Floods are another concern, Spencer said. “Fortunately, this year we don’t have a snow melt to worry about, but all these thunderstorms can create flooding,” Spencer said. “The flooding in Findlay a few years ago was caused by a summer thunderstorm complex that just sat over the city for several hours.”

Severe weather season in the Great Lakes region is typically May and June, Spencer said. It’s still unclear whether the early start will mean the season will also end early or be extended.

“There’s no way of knowing. Those are the two theories being floated,” Spencer said. “I think in the short term, over the next couple of months, we will see a very active severe weather season nationwide, including here.”

Despite the early warm weather, area planters should be wary of one more frost in late April or early May.

“There’s a potential there could be a frost issue down the road with plants,” Spencer said. “That could be a problem for farmers and gardeners.”

If the late freeze never comes, that could set the stage for a buggy summer, Spencer said. “We do want a frost and freeze to kill the fleas, mosquitoes and other bugs,” Spencer said. “We didn’t get that bad of a winter and people are saying, ‘Oh boy, it’s nice and warm,’ but wait a minute, what does that mean down the road? There’s a price to pay for everything.”

Allergy sufferers may feel the effects of the high pollen counts earlier than normal because of the warm temperatures, Spencer said.

“That’s something that’s going to be an issue for a lot of people and something to be aware of,” he said. “Everything is accelerated — allergies, blooming plants, severe weather. It’s crazy. It’s just nuts.”

Spencer said he hopes Ready U attendees leave feeling more confident about how to keep themselves safe.

“Preparedness is obviously the key with severe weather, whether it’s tornadoes, hurricanes, flooding, anything,” Spencer said. “With any natural disaster, if you are well prepared, your chances of survival are much greater.”

Emergency information packets and smoke detectors will be given away to the fi rst 50 attendees, said Red Cross Communications Specialist Jason Copsey.

Toledo Free Press is a media sponsor for the Ready U program. For more information, visit the website ready-u.com. ✯

March 21 designated to raise awareness of Down syndrome

By
Brigitta Burks
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Kaiden Rogers. Photo courtesy Sherri Rogers

Kaiden Rogers does a great elephant impression, loves pizza and tossing the ball outside.

His favorite movie is “The Wizard of Oz” and he’s quick to smile. He is like many 5-year-olds, except that he has Down syndrome.

His mother, Sherri Rogers, has been president of the Down Syndrome Association of Greater Toledo (DSAGT) for three years. One way to honor March 21, Worldwide Down Syndrome Day, and individuals like her son, is to “just take a step back and look at people as individuals. Remember that they’re all human beings and everybody deserves the same things that everybody else does,” Sherri said.

Sherri and husband Justin Rogers didn’t know Kaiden had Down syndrome during her pregnancy.

“Right at delivery, they said they thought he had Down syndrome,” she remembered.

Shortly after Kaiden’s birth, Sherri became secretary of DSAGT before moving up to president. Having Kaiden has changed her perspective in many ways.

“The reality of it is it opened my eyes to be a lot more open-minded, accepting, noticing people for who they are, not their diagnosis. It definitely made me a lot more compassionate for the special needs community. I mean, I was not an advocate for anything before,” she said.

Sherri also works for the United Way Family Information Network with special needs families. In her position with DSAGT, Sherri oversees several events, organizes advocacy efforts and provides information and support to families.

The group serves about 430 families in the Northwest Ohio area, a bit smaller than groups in Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, but Rogers has high hopes.

“Even in the past five years I’ve been involved with the Down Syndrome Association, we’ve grown so much and added so many new things. We’re not quite with the rest of them, but we’re working toward it,” Sherri said.

DSAGT also organizes a spring golf outing and the Buddy Walk in October to raise awareness and funds.

The Rogerses haven’t had many issues with the Toledo community’s acceptance of their son.

“For the most part, everybody’s very accepting of him. He has a great personality,” Sherri said.

What Kaiden gets noticed for most is his shock of red hair.

“Everybody always talks about his red hair. When people see him, they’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, look at that little redhead,’” Sherri said with a laugh.

The 5-year-old begins kindergarten this fall.

To donate to DSAGT or learn more, visit www.dsagt.org.

March is also Developmental Disabilities Awareness Month. The month kicked off with self-advocates from across the state, including about 20 people from Lucas County, traveling to the Ohio Statehouse Atrium on March 1.

Ohio Public Images, an information and advocacy group out of Toledo, along with the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities sponsored the kickoff celebration.

“Each year, the statewide kickoff event reinforces the fact that once we focus on the abilities of all citizens, we all benefit. By welcoming people with disabilities as equal community partners in the workforce, as well as in our schools and neighborhoods, our communities will be stronger,” said Lon Mitchell, executive director of Ohio Public Images.

According to REM Ohio, a group that provides services and support to those with developmental disabilities, getting to know someone with special needs is a good way to celebrate the month.

“The best way to get to know somebody [with special needs] is like getting to know anybody in the community. They have hopes and dreams just like you and me,” said Jim Oliver, director of REM Ohio’s Toledo location.

Toledoans can also attend several events put on by various groups throughout the month: ✯ Barbara McKenzie, who has a daughter with a developmental disability, is also the author of “Reflections of Erin: The Importance of Belonging, Relationships, and Learning with Each Other.” She was slated to host a free presentation at the Sanctuary of First United Methodist Church, 1526 E. Wooster St., Bowling Green at 11 a.m. March 16.

✯ Hope United Methodist Church will present a “Round and Square Dance” at 7 p.m. March 24. All proceeds will benefit Sunshine, a nonprofit offering support services to those with developmental disabilities. Tickets will be available at the door and cost $10 for adults and $6 for children. For more information, call Lindsay Graham at (419) 392-6868.

✯ A workshop “Customized Employment for Persons with Developmental Disabilities” is 6:30 p.m. March 28 at the Lucas County Board of Developmental Disabilities Family First Zone, 1155 Larc Lane. This presentation is free, but registration is required with the Autism Society of Northwest Ohio.

Visit support.autism-society.org to learn more.

Titanic re-creation dinner April 14, 2012

By
Dock David Treece
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April 14, 2012, is the 100th anniversary of the sinking of Titanic. To commemorate those lost (including several from the Toledo area) and to celebrate the continuing disaster relief efforts of the American Red Cross, an evening re-creating a Titanic dinner will take place at 6 p.m. April 14 at Central Park West.

The evening will feature a nine-course meal, ballroom dancing to music of the era and several silent auction items. Tickets are $100 per person.

Captain’s table tickets are sold out. Proceeds from the event will go to the American Red Cross, Greater Toledo Chapter. Th e evening will include:

✯ Live era music by TAPESTRY.
✯ Song memorial by Mark Graff
✯ Titanic prints signed by artist Rudolph Schroeder

✯ Titanic personal caricatures by Jim Beard

✯ Hand-rolled cigars

✯ Ballroom dance instruction by Paulette’s Dance Studio

The event is sponsored by Toledo Free Press, Louisville Title and Midwest Terminals. FOX Toledo is the event’s media partner.

The dinner is part of a Titanic memorial series that includes a commemorative issue of Toledo Free Press, displays in Toledo-Lucas County Public Libraries, Rave Motion Pictures presentation of James Cameron’s “Titanic 3D” and an artifact exhibit at Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mich.

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