EDITORIAL: Building a stronger community takes all of us
Sep. 24—A pair of good-news stories published in this newspaper over the past week serve as a reminder: when times are tough, this community is a good place to be, thanks to caring people who step up to help solve problems and share their blessings with others.
-With the announcement that it has secured a brick-and-mortar presence after several years of caravanning, the community has become better informed about the Better Together Pet Resource Center, a nonprofit service dedicated to helping Niagara County residents take better care of their pets so they don't become strays.
Operated by approximately 10 volunteers, Better Together has been a trailer-based clinic where people can bring their pets for low- or no-cost vaccination, microchipping and surgeries; the service can also help people reclaim their animals from shelters. The group has been turning up at Niagara County events, such as the health department's pop-up rabies vaccination clinics, for the past four years. Now it has commercial space in Niagara Falls where, by next year, if all goes well, a walk-in clinic will be operated and a training center established so pet owners can learn how to take best care of their animals.
Between the Covid pandemic and subsequent economic fallout, the past four years have been challenging; the rise in animal adoption during lockdown eventually was followed by a sharp increase in surrenders to shelters, all over misunderstanding about the responsibilities of pet ownership and the high cost of proper pet care. Enter the aptly named Better Together, a group who saw a different way to help the defenseless animals: by empowering their humans.
The numbers assisted to date are relatively small — not surprising since all of the labor and services are donated — but the win-win service model is quite ... fetching, isn't it?
Find out more about about this unique local charity, and how to help increase its reach, at bettertogetherpetresourcecenter.org .
-In Lockport, agents of six local small businesses have banded together to execute "Help the Homeless" on Sunday. Free food, clothing and hair cuts will be provided to people in need, along with literature on local health resources, in the area of Pine and Walnut streets.
The spark for Help the Homeless was a Facebook post by Jessica Chase, who works at I.Thrift on South Transit Street. Chase wrote that she wanted to assemble 10 boxes of food and give them to the first 10 homeless people she saw.
Josh Lopez, the operator of LO & LO's Arcade Mania at Pine and Walnut, replied with questions: If you're going to give out food, what about clothes? And, how much food could we give away?
From there, Davenee Dear / LaPort's Pine Restaurant and Will Johnson / Big Willie's Got Style got involved, along with barbers Jason Massa and Joshua Pagan. The Mental Health Association of Niagara County is contributing the literature on local resources.
The partners in Help the Homeless are small, independent retail operators weathering the same economic storm as their customers — a storm whipped up by the ever-rising cost of everything — yet they're choosing to serve people who very likely are not their paying customers. What's in it for them?
Depending on the partner, the chance to give back, or pay it forward. Either way the aim is to help shape a stronger community.
Maybe a hair cut and a clean, new outfit are the simple things someone needs to feel ready to find a job. Maybe one of those listed local health resources opens the door to supportive services and a better situation. If nothing else, a powerful message is conveyed to the down-and-out: you are seen and understood; you matter.
And as barber Massa pointed out, to pull that off, "You don't need politicians; you don't need governors. It takes us."
