Making a House a Home: the 2011 King Award

(please see our video, below.)

During the devastating April, 2007 floods, Katherine (Kate) Bialo sprung into action, collecting and distributing furniture to 65 area families who lost virtually everything to the destructive Nor’Easter.

 

Today, as President and Executive Director of The Furniture Sharehouse , Bialo has helped turn the houses of 351 low-income Westchester families into homes by making sure they have furniture at virtually no cost.

"You really need furniture and furnishings to make a house a home," says Kate.

 Those efforts will be officially honored next week when Bialo, a Larchmont resident, will receive the 2011 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Award given by the Tri-Municipal Human Rights Committee of Larchmont & Mamaroneck.

 She will receive the award at the committee’s 24th Annual Program celebrating the memory of Dr. King, which will be held at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday Jan. 12 at Larchmont Avenue Church.

“The program being planned will honor Kate Bialo as an individual who exemplifies locally the equal rights and equal opportunity dream of Dr. King,” said Mamaroneck Town Supervisor Valerie O’Keeffe.

In addition, a special recognition will be made posthumously in memory of James McDonald who died suddenly on September 5, 2010. 

McDonald chaired a fundraiser to benefit both the Hope Food Pantry in New Rochelle and to help theLarchmont/Mamaroneck Hunger Task Force.

Mary Stanton, the author of several books on the civil rights movement, will speak at the event, being co-sponsored by the Human Rights Committee and Local Summit.

The event is open to the community. For more information, please call 381-7805.

In 2008, the editor produced a story on the Furniture Sharehouse for PBS:

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