Mystery Pair Donate $10,000 To Family Charity

While most charities and social agencies are struggling to find enough funding to support the many demands on their resources, one Tauranga charity has just benefited from a very generous donation from two strangers.

Families Achieving Balance manager Maxine Dyer said her organisation was visited by a man and his mother on Tuesday.

“They came to the door and asked to talk to someone about making a donation. I was a bit shocked and wondered if it was a scam at first but spoke with them about Families Achieving Balance. They wanted to know what we do and what outcomes we achieve”.

“They didn’t say a lot about themselves and particularly didn’t want any public recognition of their donation but said they had been looking to donate to a charity and searched the web under families and children and found us.”

Families Achieving Balance supports families and individuals dealing with parenting challenges, behavioural difficulties, conflict resolution, financial stress, family violence, relationship breakdowns or emotional and mental wellbeing.

Its social workers run programmes for families, mums, dads, grandparents, teen mothers and individuals that include safe and healthy relationships, creative arts therapy, parenting, empowerment and healing from family harm.

For children and youth, the programmes support emotional regulation, communication skills, respectful talk and touch, courage and healing while building self-esteem, resilience and confidence while also having fun on various outings. One-to-one support is also provided.

“They really liked our website, so looked at our financial report under the Charites Service. They liked what they saw, particularly the Caring Dads and fathering aspects,” Maxine said.

As they were leaving they said they were impressed and would be making a donation.Later that afternoon they deposited $10,000 into the organisation’s account.

“What a wonderful thing to do,” she said.

SociaLink General Manager Liz Davies said charities really need to hear a good story at the moment.

"The funding environment from all sources is really tight at the moment and some small organisations that deliver vital services to children and whānau are potentially facing closure due to the delays in funding from Oranga Tamariki," she said.

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