For 2021, we’ve adopted a local family, Scott and Ellen Park of Virginia Beach. They have an incredibly inspirational story! In 2015, Scott Park got a taste of internet fame... he went viral for missing a half-court shot that could have won him $1Million... had he made it. The journalist who posted the missed shot soon realized he'd missed his mark in giving people someone to joke on. You see, Scott and Ellen Park dedicated their lives to helping and mentoring the youth of the community. Going above and beyond in many instances to make sure that teens had positive experiences in their lives. Both Scott and Ellen took such joy in encouraging kids to reach for the stars and never give up. In 2009, Scott's health started fading. After numerous tests and doctor visits, he was diagnosed with CAPS, a disease where his blood clots and attacks his organs. He was in desperate need of a new kidney and his friend happily donated him one of his. With the help of the new kidney, about 39 medications, and frequent trips to Johns Hopkins, Scott was able to resume a moderately normal life with his disease kept at bay. Scott knew he would never have the strength to make that shot but he decided to go through with it anyway, to show the kids he mentored that even he never gave up, even knowing the odds, and his health, were stacked against him. Shortly after his infamous basketball shot, Scott had another setback with his health. He suffered a series of strokes. Doctors soon discovered that his disease had progressed and the medicines were not helping. The strokes were being caused by his disease attacking his brain. After being in a coma, Scott has rebounded some but he's lost the usage of his right arm, lost the ability to walk, and has to have 24/7 care. Scott's wife, Ellen has stood by Scott and cared for him through it all. Ellen is now Scott's full-time caregiver. With all the medical bills and time spent on Doctor appointments and general care, there are no funds or time left over to maintain their house. Their house has several repair projects needed so the MRW Foundation is reaching out to the community to rally behind the Parks. The Parks have seen how quickly the internet can catch on to an embarrassing moment and run with it, but we'd like to show them how quickly the internet can be used to care and lift them up. If you'd like to contribute, The MRW Foundation has a GoFundMe page where anyone can contribute. Help us take care of the Parks in 2021. visit https://charity.gofundme.com/o/en/campaign/2021-adopt-a-family-the-parks to contribute.

Here at RbA of Virginia Beach our #RenewalCares Park Project is continuing to move forward! As most of you know, we “adopted” the Park family for the year of 2021, to help them with cleaning, organizing, home repairs, landscaping, and home health care for Scott. Over the last few months, Scott had some ER and hospital visits to Johns Hopkins that have slowed our progress just a bit, but we’ve accomplished a lot since our previous update. Dust Bunnies Banished! We enlisted the help of 2 different crews on two separate Saturday mornings to get everything cleaned. On one Saturday a crew went to the Park home and washed all the walls, trim, doors, baseboards, fans, and light fixtures on the second floor. With Swiffers, vacuums, buckets, rags and sponges in hand, we cleaned the entire 2nd floor literally from top to bottom, excluding the 2 bathrooms and laundry room. Clean as a whistle! Then on another Saturday, another crew went back out to the Park’s home to tackle the two 2nd floor bathrooms and laundry room. Again, with scrubbers, sponges, rags and lots of cleaners, we made those rooms sparkle, top to bottom. Oh, and our very own President, Gerry Rogers took on the laundry room himself! And it looked great! We were able to provide outside caregivers to stay with Scott for a long weekend so that Ellen could go visit her parents. She hadn’t seen them in over a year. Ellen also got to spend time with one of her daughters and her precious grandchildren. Man versus Nature! Shawn, our Install manager, enlisted the help of his Uncle Tony who owns Spera LLC - a landscaping company. They met with a crew of team members and some of their family members at the Park home to do some landscaping. Tony headed up our mission, assessed the situation, and assigned all of us a job to do. We cut down a couple trees, trimmed some other trees, tidied up overgrown bushes and plants, weeded, and really helped to tame the yard. We even had some youngsters (Shawn’s sons) out to help! It was a beautiful day to be outside working and the result was just as beautiful! Thank you to everyone who came out that day to help! And a huge thank you to Tony Spera for heading up the landscaping project AND for volunteering to mow the Park’s yard EVERY week!!! WOW! Never underestimate the power of a fresh coat of paint! A crew of 8 and a 1/2 people met at the Parks house armed with rollers, brushes, step ladders, and smiles. We painted the entire upstairs level of the house. If you’re wondering how we could have a 1/2 person, that was our sweet “little” helper, Emmaleigh. Emmaleigh is the daughter of Brittney, in Processing, and Darrius, in Proximity. The entire second floor of the Park home now has a fresh coat of beautiful paint! And, we knocked it out in about 4 hours! What a difference it makes. But there’s still plenty of work left to do in order to help this very deserving couple. Thanks to the great staff at RbA of Virginia Beach, we always have plenty of people who volunteer their time and energy to accomplish this labor of love.

RbA - Virginia Beach is on a mission to help supply access to clean drinking water and hand washing stations to every man, woman, and child in Rwanda by 2022 AND we are ahead of our four year schedule! We are pleased to announce that through the hard work of our staff, our Foundation was able to send another $100,000 to World Vision in June. That brings our total contribution to $350,000 of our $1M pledge. Through World Vision's water projects, $50 provides one person with clean water for life!. So far, we have helped provide access to clean drinking water for life to roughly 7,000 people or 14 villages. We are well on our way to do our part in reaching our goal of 20,000 people or 40 villages. For more information, please click on this link: https://www.worldvision.org/category/clean-water-news-stories

Gerry Rogers, owner of Renewal by Andersen’s retail affiliate in Virginia Beach, VA, wanted to do something special to help the local community during the COVID-19 pandemic. Rogers felt especially grateful to the nurses, doctors, first responders, and frontline workers. Rogers committed to donating a portion of all sales in May and June, up to $100,000, to the Sentara COVID-19 Community Relief Fund. Sentara Healthcare has several hospitals and a number of healthcare facilities throughout the Virginia Beach area. Donations to the fund are used to support programs, partners, and employees of Sentara, and people affected by COVID-19. The team at RbA Virginia Beach banded together to make Roger’s mission a reality. It was a group effort from all departments, with the Design Consultants taking it over the goal line and achieving a whopping 93-percent increase, year-over-year. That’s right, sales in May and June were nearly double the previous year! A portion of the $100,000 donation has already helped the community in many ways. From providing PPE to helping purchase medications for those most in need. It’s also helped local heroes through the Sentara H.O.P.E Fund for employees. One Sentara employee, Sylvia M., shared a personal story about how the fund helped her when she needed it most. “I was exposed while working at the screening and testing sites for COVID-19. I’ve had to quarantine home for the last 14 days. At the same time, we had a death in the family associated to COVID-19 and significant funeral expenses. My husband has been furloughed and without a job. It’s been rough time making ends meet,” she writes. “They have been our caregivers and our heroes through the Coronavirus and I wanted to give back to them, and to the community that has given me so much over the past 34 years,” says Rogers.

RbA Virginia Beach was honored to host a Backpack Giveaway for local school children. Whether kids are in a school classroom or virtual this year, they need supplies to make learning easier. In addition to hosting the 'drive-thru' backpack giveaway, we also donated $1,000 to be used to purchase supplies to stuff the backpacks. 200 backpacks were given away to very grateful parents and excited children.

The MRW Foundation has been a proud supporter of the Union Mission for several years. It’s more than just a place to live for our homeless neighbors. While they do provide housing and three meals a day, they also help people find jobs, learn life skills to keep them off the street, provide medical assistance, and spiritual care. While monetary support enables The Union Mission to give folks a hand up, The Mission itself needs helping hands too. And that’s just what the MRW staff did as a team and family! We went to work in October and prepared, cooked, and served a spaghetti dinner to the people currently living at the Union Mission. We had a group of people who went to the main kitchen in the men’s shelter to prepare and actually cook the meal in their industrial-sized kitchen! We cooked and prepared food for about 300 people! The shelter is set up with two dining areas. One for the men and one for the women. First we had a group of employees and family members who served food to the men at the men’s shelter. Then, we transported food from the kitchen to the women’s shelter. We had two groups of ladies who served at the women’s shelter, first to the single women living there and then to a group of women with their children. What a great experience for all of us to really get our hands in there and help out the people in our very own community! It was such a privilege we had to be able to help those in need.