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danville_weekly_largeThis article appeared in the June Issue of the Danville Weekly

Ken Behring always knew he was going places. Raised in poverty during the Great Depression, he started earning money at the age of 6 by catching nightcrawlers and selling them for a nickel a can.

But a bicycle was the real catalyst of his life as a small businessman. Behring got a paper route and began to teach himself the entrepreneurship lessons that would serve him throughout his life.

“That bicycle gave me freedom and mobility for the first time,” he writes in his autobiography, “Road to Purpose.”

It’s little wonder that decades later, the multimillionaire Blackhawk developer would find
his life’s purpose in helping others go places they had never dreamed they could go. Behring’s establishment of the foundation that has provided almost half a million needy people with mobility through donations of wheelchairs happened either by accident, coincidence or divine intervention, depending on one’s view of how the world works.

In the late ‘90s, Behring was doing a lot of traveling around the world, especially to Africa for big game hunting. On his expeditions, local trackers would take him to villages to visit schools and health clinics. Behring was dismayed at the primitive conditions and the lack of basic necessities, so he began to solicit donations of medical and educational supplies to take back with him on future trips. In 1999, the LDS Charities heard about what he was doing and asked him to take emergency food, clothing, blankets and other supplies to Kosovo refugees. After loading Behring’s plane, there was a little space left, so the volunteers asked him to stop by Romania and deliver wheelchairs to a hospital there.

“We had the space for six wheelchairs,” Behring writes. “Little did I know that these six wheelchairs would alter the direction of my life.”

Behring was struck by what he learned on that trip. A doctor in Romania explained that in third world countries, people are often ashamed of the disabled and treat them as less than human. A common belief is that people born with disabilities are being punished for sins of the family, so both they and their families are stigmatized.

“Nobody wants to see them crawl on their stomach and they’re too big to carry,” says Behring, “So they lay in a pile of rags in the back of a hut and just get one meal a day. I have seen people living in boxes in back rooms.”

In Romania, Behring was introduced to an old man, a World War II vet, who had lost his wife and then suffered a stroke.

“When we lifted him into his wheelchair, he started to cry,” Behring remembers. “He
said, ‘Now I can go out and talk to my neighbors.’”

“It was the first time that I really got that feeling of how much (giving someone a wheelchair) means,” he says. “Not only are you giving them mobility, but you’re showing them that somebody cares, and you’re giving their life back.”

“I had previously seen wheelchairs as a form of confinement,” he writes. “I didn’t comprehend the liberation that one could bring to those who are unable to afford them.”

Behring continued to make trips to poor countries around the world delivering wheelchairs. Seeing the gratitude of the recipients and the huge impact that the gifts had on the disabled and their families brought Behring profound joy, and something more-purpose.

In June 2000, Behring launched the Wheelchair Foundation with a pledge of $15 million from his personal foundation and an international board of advisors including Nelson Mandela, King Juan Carlos and Mikhail Gorbachev.

“My father felt this could become a worldwide movement,” says David Behring, president of the Wheelchair Foundation and Ken’s son. “It’s a massive problem and no
one person could do it, so we solicited help from many charitable, religious, corporate to supply 1 million wheelchairs. We’re probably going to reach the half-million mark in
six years.”

Today the Wheelchair Foundation has provided chairs to 145 countries all over the world. The wheelchairs operate manually, are built to get around in primitive areas, and utilize puncture-proof tires to make them more durable.

Each wheelchair can be purchased and delivered for an average of $150. The chairs normally cost $500 in the United States, but the large quantities that the foundation purchases enable them to pay much less. The foundation is gifted with matching funds so that every $75 donation will purchase a wheelchair in a developing country. For developed countries, a $150 donation purchases a wheelchair.

Wheelchairs are sent in containers of 280. Individuals can request that their donation goes to providing a chair for a disabled person in a particular country, but not to a specific person. Religious and civic groups often will sponsor an entire container of chairs to a developing country for $21,000. The groups typically pay their own way to deliver the chairs and often combine the trip with other humanitarian donations or volunteer work.

The foundation distributes wheelchairs through non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in each country that determine recipients with the greatest need.

“One provision is that no wheelchairs are sold,” says David. “Everyone who gets a chair is impoverished. They have to have a permanent disability and be poor enough that they can’t afford a wheelchair on their own.”

A year and a half ago, the foundation opened a gallery within the Blackhawk Museum to educate the public about the conditions that currently exist around the world and to explain why there is such an overwhelming need for wheelchairs-estimated at between 100 million to 200 million.

Causes of disability include natural disasters, such as earthquakes, which have particularly devastating effects in third world countries, car accidents (exacerbated by poor road conditions and ramshackle vehicles), war injuries, advanced age and birth defects, which are often caused by contaminated water and lack of prenatal care. Some of the most horrific causes of disabilities are landmines.

“Landmines are not an issue in the U.S., but they’re still being planted in countries all over the world-Afghanistan, Iraq and Colombia. Then there are the leftover landmines
from Vietnam and Eastern Europe,” says David. “It only costs one dollar to plant a landmine, but it costs one thousand dollars to remove one, so nobody ever removes them.”

Young children playing and farmers walking through fields often step on the landmines, which are designed to blow off the victim’s legs. In some countries the toll of landmines is unimaginable.

“Angola went through a major civil war about 20 years ago. They have the highest rate of landmine victims in the world,” says David. “It’s estimated that as much as 20 percent of the population of 12 million is disabled.”

The foundation has a multitude of partners who are actively involved in their mission, including Rotary Clubs, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Knights
of Columbus, ChevronTexaco, the Oakland Athletics and many others.

Val Nunes, one of the founders of Wine for Wheels, an organization that raises funds through culinary and wine events, just returned from a distribution in China where
they gave away 360 wheelchairs.

“It was one of the best days I ever had,” he says. “It was as close to heaven as you can
get on earth.”

In the four years that Nunes has volunteered for the Wheelchair Foundation, he has helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars and made several humanitarian trips all over the world. Nunes and his wife, Belia, plan their vacations around the distributions and have taken along their daughters, too.

“We take the kids to teach them how to be contributors to the world,” he says. “It’s the best way I can spend money and time and energy. When I see (the disabled), and they are so left out of society, and something as small as a wheelchair can completely change their life.”

Beyond improving the lives of the recipients, the foundation may have an even more important and far-reaching role.

“We are creating international friendship, and the wheelchair distribution is the catalyst for it,” says David.

Nunes agrees.

“We went with about 20 volunteers and we shook all their hands and talked to them, spreading good will,” he says. “Sometimes the impression of Americans is that we’re always just consuming. This shows that we care.”

The Behrings believe that because of its size and geopolitics, China is an especially important relationship for the United States. “We have to gain China’s support against terrorism,” says David. “They want their economy to grow, and I always tell people that with economic freedom, political freedom is going to follow.”

In May 2004, the foundation sponsored the donation of 1,000 wheelchairs in China-the largest distribution of wheelchairs in the world.

Ken Behring has learned through his travels that people all over the world are just like us and that it’s important for both peace and the global economy for us to form strong international relationships.

“The surprising thing is how small the world is and how much help is needed,” says Behring. “You don’t have to give a lot.”

“The thanks that you get back is so much greater than what you’re giving,” says David. “I remember this 80-year-old woman in Guatemala who broke down crying and hugging me and she wouldn’t let go. She said in Spanish, ‘I’ve been praying for God to send me an angel ever since I had my accident. You are the angel that God sent me.’”

Comments from the Morehead, Kentucky Sister Cities wheelchair distribution in China

The ceremony took place on March 26th in Yangshuo China. Sister Cities of Morehead, Kentucky gave 93 wheelchairs and handicapped tricycles. Another charity, White Lion International, gave more wheelchairs to make 163 in all. Both Charities were featured at the dedication ceremony, and we both had to give speeches.  I presented a Kentucky flag and Morehead City flag to the state and city representatives.  I also presented a friendship quilt from the Busy Bees Quilting Club. The ladies of the club enclosed a club picture in a pocket on the back of the quilt along with a greeting to Yangshuo.  They hoped to exchange quilt patterns with quilters in Yangshuo, but that craft is not practiced there. The quilters also sent a pattern book to encourage quilting in Yangshuo. 

The logo for the chairs was designed to show friendship between America and China- thus Wheelchairs for Peace. We only had one night to come up with the logo, but I think it spoke well from our hearts.  Yangshuo gave me the logo banner after the ceremony, and we intend to display it at our future events in Morehead.  That is why the American flag comes first on the banner to be displayed in America, but second on the wheelchairs that will stay in China. 
I could not hold back the tears when I saw two grown men waddling on their feet like ducks to reach their new chairs. They held their ankles and moved their feet one foot at a time. Others had brought little stools that they used like walkers or used crutches to reach their chairs.  Most people had relatives or friends to help them get to their chairs, but the young people wearing sashes also helped the handicapped people reach their chairs. Later our van passed one man who had taken off down the road. He was several miles from where the ceremony took place.  In a country of bicycles a handicapped person on a tricycle fits right in. The tricycles used a lever pumping action to move and could go pretty fast. Regular wheelchairs were given to those that could not use their hands effectively, but the tricycle people were completely independent and able to travel under their own efforts. 

The most outstanding thing to me was seeing our desk clerk’s husband receive a wheelchair. She had been very kind to the Sister Cities teachers last summer and now we were able to see her husband get his very own wheelchair.  She was so grateful and thanked us profusely.  Another little girl had cerebral palsy and could not control her movements.  She was heavy, so a wheelchair will really help her caretakers who seemed to be carrying her everywhere.  It was a moving ceremony for all involved and worth all the effort to raise the money.
Sincerely,
Betty Cutts

This article appeared in the Electronic Retailer magazine March 2006 issues. For a printable PDF version of this article, please click here.

In June 2005, former ERA Chairman Dan Danielson proposed to the Electronic Retailing Association’s (ERA) board of directors an idea that would allow both the association and the industry to give back to the community. “We have a lot of negative [publicity] thrown around about us as an industry, and we wanted to do something positive,” says Danielson, CEO of Mercury Media. The idea was to pick a charity and to put the creative talents, time and skills of the industry to good use.

“ERA has many great volunteer leaders [who] serve as members and board members,” ERA board member and CEO of Northern Response (Int’l), Ltd., Richard Stacey observes. “Many of ERA’s members have been looking to develop ways to ‘give back” and to help others.”

The Wheelchair Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing wheelchairs to those in need, seemed like the perfect fit. “What [is appealing] about this charity,” Danielson states, “is that it’s measurable, like our business. A contribution of $75 is equal to the delivery of one wheelchair – you can see the benefits! The charity is also international in scope.”

Acting on the support he received from the board, Danielson contacted Chris Lewis, director vice president -public education for the Wheelchair Foundation, to learn more about how ERA and the industry could get involved.

WHAT IS THE WHEELCHAIR FOUNDATION?

Established on June 13, 2000, the Wheelchair Foundation began with a simple mission: to deliver wheelchairs to people worldwide who needed them, but were unable to afford one. Lewis says the foundation estimates that over 100 million people in the world are in need of a wheelchair. Almost six years since its formation, the foundation has become the most efficient delivery source of mobility devices in the world.

“It’s a way we can immediately improve the quality of a person’s life with a $75 donation – that’s about what it costs to go out to dinner these days,” Lewis notes. “A lot of people don’t like the fact that you write a check to an organization and you don’t know where the money goes. Everybody knows that a wheelchair costs more than $75, so if you can write a check and see that a tangible item has been delivered for that small donation, [it] means so much.”

Donations are distributed in several ways. Because the organization is sponsor-driven, wheelchairs often are delivered to whatever location the sponsor designates. Corporations like Wal-Mart and Chevron have sponsored wheelchairs into communities where they have operations or partnerships, in an effort to give back. In addition, the foundation also tries to focus on landmine countries. They work closely with the U.S. State Department, which supplies matched funding on a yearly basis, and have sent wheelchairs into Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam, Columbia and Cambodia – all landmine hotspots.

Wheelchairs are delivered in containers of 280 directly from factories
in China, the largest wheelchair manufacturers in the world, to non-governmental organizations within the countries of destination. To date, the foundation has delivered or committed over 429,000 wheelchairs. Initially, its fantasy goal was to deliver 1 million wheelchairs in the first five years.

“For many reasons, this [goal] just has not been able to be realized,” Lewis admits, “primarily because of the inability to produce and deliver large numbers of wheelchairs efficiently.

Every country has different importation laws, customs and clearances and they’re constantly changing. When you’re dealing with 145 countries, it’s not like a spigot where you can just open it. If we had unlimited funding, which would be wonderful, we could get a lot more wheelchairs out.”

Lewis is quick to point out that while there are frustrations keeping them from being able to expand as quickly as they might like, “the mechanism by which we’re spreading the word of what we’re doing is by helping a great number of people get involved in the mission, and we’re seeing it as a very steady relief effort.”

Spearheaded by Danielson, ERA’s charitable initiative aims to bolster this relief effort and get as many people involved as possible. Together, he and many other industry professionals are creating a direct response campaign for the foundation. Danielson explains, “We want to bring in not only industry donations, from services to cash, but also to brand the foundation to the public and to bring in cash donations to the foundation through this campaign.”

DR HELPS GENERATE AWARENESS AND SUPPORT

Industry response to this initiative has been extremely positive. A variety of companies have already committed time and services to make the Wheelchair Foundation direct response campaign a success. Production services have already been offered by several firms, in addition to donations for telemarketing, tape duplication, media placement, airtime, international distribution, print and more.

“Being involved in something as worthwhile as this allows us to utilize our considerable talents collaboratively with other ERA members to achieve something that will have a measurable global significance, as well as an incredibly uplifting effect on our agency and all the groups that participate,” says Steve Netzley, president and COO of Euro RSCG 4D DRTV, of the group effort. The agency is one of several firms donating their media buying resources, including Cmedia and Mercury Media. Icon Media Direct is also contributing media placement, reaching out to national cable, network and national syndicators to get them involved in airing the foundation spot. “I think that people in the direct response industry know how to make people respond better than any other industry in the world,” says Nancy Lazkani, Icon Media’s president and CEO.

AN INTERNATIONAL, MULTI-CULTURAL EFFORT

John Bramm, managing director of TV Network UK, agrees with Lazkani. “DR is a powerful medium to raise awareness of a project or product and with a little time and effort dedicated by the entire industry, we could be an important vehicle.” He adds that TV Network’s “aim is to provide all the necessary exposure and treatment that the Wheelchair Foundation and its benefactors deserve. With access to over 150 hours of airtime a day, we are able to reach a huge section of the British public.”

In addition to TV Network UK, other companies have signed on to commit their resources to help make this campaign an international one. Oak Lawn Marketing will contribute resources in Japan and Northern Response (Int’l), Ltd. will assist in Canada. “PanLatinoTV will help bring together the effort in Latin America,” confirms President Stan Bruckheim. “The effort for Latin America will involve local distributors, production facilities, media networks and call centers.”

In addition to making sure that the campaign reaches a variety of countries and cultures around the world, the program also includes efforts to reach the Spanish-speaking community in the U.S. DR company 28:30 LLC “has been asked to handle the management of TV spot placement for the U.S. Hispanic marketplace,” says President Brooke Thomas. The firm will be involved in the conversation of the English productions into Spanish in particular.

SECURING AIRTIME

Stacy Durand, chief marketing officer of Revenue Frontier, LLC, whose company has agreed to donate airtime, is pleased to see the industry focus on a cause like the Wheelchair Foundation and to see such a variety of contributions, including those from competing firms. “We’re a very competitive industry. When you look at the media agencies [involved], these are agencies that pitch against each other every single day. It’s nice to come together for a cause.”

Revenue Frontier is one of several firms currently committed to providing airtime. Paxson Communications, which has provided free short form time to a variety of charitable organizations, including Feed the Children and the American Red Cross, hopes to utilize its family friendly network to help target the campaign’s exact audience. DIRECTV and Discovery Communications are also making substantial contributions.

ADDITIONAL SERVICES

This campaign’s success relies not just on the production, media placement, talent and distribution services being donated. It also requires the significant support of those companies that have agreed to provide services like telemarketing, payment processing, tape duplication and shipment.

Treehouse Media is “contributing customization and duplication of the tnfomercial and/or spots and distributing to the stations,” Vice President Andy Donate details. “We’re incurring those costs. It’s the end of the cycle. After the show’s produced, we have to make these different versions with different numbers and distribute them to the stations.”

Also providing customization, duplication and shipping services is PMT. Bill Hynes, president of PMT, presented his employees with information on the Wheelchair Foundation and asked for their input on the company’s involvement. “Every employee,” he says, “saw this as an opportunity to contribute to a foundation that can make a dramatic difference in a demonstrable and measurable way and is looking forward to the opportunity to utilize every resource we have to make a contribution.”

Companies Currently
Contributing to the Project

Airtime
DIRECTV
Discovery Communications
Revenue Frontier,
LLC Paxson Communications
Credit Card Processing
Transfirst ePayment Services
Donation
Earl Greenburg Foundation
Home Shopping
ShopNBC
International
Canada – Northern Response
(Int’l), Ltd.
Japan – Oak Lawn Marketing
Latin America – PanLatinoTV
United Kingdom – TV Network UK
Internet
Livemercial
Long Form Media Placement
Euro RSCG 4D DRTV Mercury
Media
Long Form Production
Take 2 Productions Print
Novus Print Media
Publicity
Electronic Retailing Association
Radio
Marketing Architects Salem
Radio
Short Form Media Placement
Icon Media Direct Cmedia
Short Form Production
BobCaudill Caudill & Associates
Tape Duplication and Shipment
PMT
Tree House Media
Talent
Jack King Celebrity Broker
Telemarketing
LiveOps
West Corporation
U.S. Hispanic
28:30 LLC

TAKING THE CAMPAIGN TO PRINT, RADIO

The scope of this initiative extends even beyond a long form and short form spot production campaign and distribution. To supplement the DRTV campaigns in generating awareness for the Wheelchair Foundation, several companies have signed on to offer Internet, print and radio services.

One company supplying radio expertise is Marketing Architects. “We’re working in tandem with the other participants by providing strategic input on the program, 800 numbers to measure performance and creative execution. Overall, this will reach well over 10 million radio impressions per month across the country,” says Paul Schield, the firm’s director of business development.

Also widening the campaign’s reach is Novus Print Media. The company’s senior director of business development John Bosacker says, “Novus will be focused on planning and placing donation driven ads for the Wheelchair Foundation in daily paid newspapers (both national and local newspapers) and in national magazines.” Bosacker adds that “overall total circulation could reach in excess of 45 million readers within the scope of the program.”

SETTING AN EXAMPLE AND MEASURING SUCCESS

With the talents of so many companies and industry professionals combined, everyone is hopeful that the campaign will be a success. And just like this industry, Electronic Retailer magazine and ERA will measure this campaign’s success and publish its results throughout the year. This effort is the first of its kind donated to the Wheelchair Foundation, and it provides the opportunity not only to increase donations and participation, but also to elevate awareness of a truly worthwhile cause.

“When an industry pulls together behind a project like this,” Hynes notes, “the industry sets an example of how business can give back to the world community in new ways. Perhaps we can set an example for other industries and give those who need help a different message of who we are.”

HOW YOU CAN GET INVOLVED

With such an extensive project, there is ample opportunity for anyone and everyone to get involved. More information on the Wheelchair Foundation can be found at its web site www.wheelchairfoundation. org. If you are interested in being a part of this industry-wide effort and providing time and services, please contact Dan Danielson of Mercury Media at da*@me**********.com. To instead make a monetary donation, please make checks payable to the Wheelchair Foundation and submit to ERA, Attn: Molly Alton Mullins, 2000 North 14th Street, Suite 300, Arlington, VA 22201.

Kelley Kaufman serves as ERA’s communications manager and publications specialist. We would appreciate your feedback. To submit comments, point your browser to wheelchairfounda-tionmar06.marketing-era.com.

ca_state_secretary_largeThis article appeared in the Knights of Columbus Columbia Magazine March 2006 Issue.  For a printable PDF version of this article, please click here.

Ken Behring went as far as he could by cab. Then he got out and hiked through the Vietnamese countryside, pushing the wheelchair he planned to give to a girl he’d never met before. Finally he reached the little house where she lived with her parents.

“This little girl had never been able to walk,” said Behring. “She lay on a pile of rags in the corner. She was about 7 years old and she had never moved on her own.”

That was before she got a wheelchair.

“It took a while, hut we finally showed her how” to use the chair, Behring recalled. “When she finally moved herself, she just broke into the biggest smile there’s ever been.”

This girl was one of the first people to benefit from Behring’s Wheelchair Foundation – and Behring will never forget her, because she showed him that a wheelchair represents more than mobility, more than freedom.

“We’re showing people that somebody cares,” Behring explained. “That they are important.”

THE WHEELCHAIR FOUNDATION

Founded in June 2000, the Wheelchair Foundation buys up to 10,000 wheelchairs a month. They are distributed around the world with the help of distribution partners including the U.S. government, United Nations organizations, and nongovernmental organizations from the Red Cross to Rotary Clubs, and now the Knights
of Columbus. As of early 2006, the Wheelchair Foundation had distributed or committed to distribute nearly 425,000 wheelchairs – but much remains to be done. An estimated 100 to 150 million people around the world are in need of a wheelchair. Fewer than 1 percent own or have access to one.

These are statistics that Behring, former owner of football’s Seattle
Seahawks, discovered after his first wheelchair donation. He had a habit
of carrying relief supplies on his MD-87 jet when he traveled around the world. In 1999, the supplies he took on a trip to Eastern Europe included wheelchairs. When he saw how dramatically – and immediately – a wheelchair could change an individual’s life, the idea for the Wheelchair Foundation was born.

For every donation of $75 the foundation receives, it provides matching funds to purchase a wheel-chair for $150. The chairs are shipped, 280 at a time in massive containers, directly to the destination nation; at last count, chairs have been distributed in 143 countries at no cost to the recipients.

When he started the Wheelchair Foundation, Behring was no newcomer to philanthropy. He established the Seattle Seahawks Charitable Foundation and has donated tens of millions of dollars to numerous causes. But in some ways, the Wheelchair Foundation has been as big a help to him as it has been to the wheelchair recipients themselves.

“I’ve been very successful in my life in business,” explained Behring. “At that point in my life, no longer was there anything I wanted to buy or anyplace to go. I felt there had to be something else.”

Headquartered in Northern California, the Wheelchair Foundation has an international staff of 25 – including two of Behring’s sons – and a board of advisers that includes the king and queen of Spain, Mikhail Gorbachev, Jerry Lewis and Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson.

A UNIQUE PARTNERSHIP

The California State Council has begun working with the Wheelchair Foundation, even though, as State Deputy Gary Nelson said, it’s “not the most usual thing” for Knights to partner with another organization. But the California Knights are simply following the example of the Supreme Council.

In 2002, Supreme Knight Anderson met a member of the Wheelchair Foundation. By 2003, that meeting had blossomed into a working relationship: the Supreme Council sponsored 2,000 wheel-chairs to be distributed in Afghanistan. In 2004-05, the Supreme Council sponsored 2,000 chairs for distribution in the Middle East, the Philip-pines and Mexico. In 2006, 2,000 more are being distributed in the Philippines, Mexico and Poland.

Also in 2002, the Wheelchair Foundation arranged a meeting with some of the state officers of the California Knights. Don Gentleman, a member of Msgr. Francis X. Singleton Council 10248 in Clovis, attended that meeting. Then a Fourth Degree master and program chair for the state, Gentleman heard about a planned wheelchair distribution in Guatemala. He decided to go along and see for himself what the Wheelchair Foundation is all about.

“Those distributions are so touching. They really yank at your heartstrings,” said Gentleman, now the California State Wheelchair Program chairman.

“One fellow came in. He’d been carrying his wife on his back for 12 years. We put her in a wheelchair, and that man cried like a baby.”

When Gentleman returned to his council and to his work at the state level, he told about his experiences in Guatemala. The California Knights immediately began taking up collections for wheelchairs, but it wasn’t until 2005 that the program began to soar.
The goal for 2005-06 is to donate $96,000 to the Wheelchair Foundation. By early December, about $65,000 had already been raised. In April 2005, a group of California Knights joined Knights of Northern Mexico in a wheelchair distribution in three Mexican cities.

“I am a little amazed at the donations coming in because of the hurricanes and the [Order’s Gulf States Disaster Relief] Katrina fund and all,” Gentleman admitted. “I expected a big, sharp drop, but if anything, we had an increase during that period.”

’MESSENGERS TO THE WORLD’

For Chris Lewis, public education director for the Wheelchair Foundation and son of entertainer Jerry Lewis, the Knights’ partnership is particularly meaningful.

“I’m so tickled, I can’t tell you, about how this has been coming about,” said Lewis, a Knight since 2000. “There are so many like-minded people within the Order who are concerned about improving the quality of people’s lives, and are wondering how they can do it.”

State Deputy Nelson has helped the Knights of California see how they can do it. He asked every KC unit in the state to raise $150 before the end of his term; that means that, with the foundation’s matching funds, each assembly, council, Columbian Squires circle and chapter will fund the purchase of two wheelchairs. Each wheelchair purchased with the help of Knights’ donations bears a Knights of Columbus emblem.

“The thing that benefits us the most is awareness,” said Lewis. “People just don’t believe that you can sponsor the delivery of a brand-new wheelchair for $75. The message that the Knights are carrying to their councils, to their parishes, and outside to the community, is what’s causing so many people to get involved.

“What they have become is our messengers to the world.”

Its not only Knights who are spreading the word about the Wheelchair Foundation. Marilyn Willour, wife of Past State Deputy Ross Willour of St. Columban Council 3926 in Westminster, made a presentation about the foundation at Trinity Episcopal Church in Orange, Calif., where she was the administrator until her recent retirement. “I think people may be tired of me talking about it,” she said with a chuckle, “but I bring up the wheelchairs whenever I can.”

HANDS-ON SPIRITUALITY

A donated wheelchair affects the recipient physically. But the California Knights who went on the distribution trip in Mexico saw very clearly how wheelchairs impact the recipients emotionally and spiritually – and felt how the distribution affected them, too.

Past State Deputy William Przybyla of Redding Council 3978 went to Mexico last year for the foundation’s distribution, and recalls seeing a young man with a spasm condition receive a wheelchair. “To see the father getting tears in his eyes, because now he was going to be able to get his son around – it was very emotional,” said Przybyla. “It didn’t just impact the person receiving the wheelchair; it impacts the family.

“Actually participating in a distribution, you get to see your work come to fruition,” he added. “It really does make you a better person.”

Jim Letcher, Fourth Degree master of the Northern California District, shows a recently produced DVD of the Knights’ wheelchair distribution in Mexico each time he installs new officers for an assembly. “I always get very emotional when I see this movie,” he said. “I talk about how it affects me – how spiritual it is for me to help someone I don’t even know.”

He then passes around a hat so Knights can donate to the Wheelchair Foundation. “By the time the hat comes around, I’ve always had $150 or more,” said Letcher.

The Knights’ partnership with the Wheelchair Foundation may be unusual, but it’s also perfectly fitting, said Nelson, a member of Father Walter O’Brien Council 3518 in San Lorenzo.

“‘In service to One, in service to all.’ This [program] is the ‘all,’” he said.
“It doesn’t matter that they’ve never heard of the Knights of Columbus; what matters is, we can help.”

HOW KNIGHTS CAN HELP

To learn more about the Wheelchair Foundation, go to www.wheelchairfoundation.org. There you can view the video of the California and Mexico Knights participating in the Mexican wheelchair distribution by clicking on “Videos.” To order the DVD from the Supreme Council, contact Columbia magazine at or by e-mail at co******@ko**.org.

To find out how your council can join the Wheelchair Foundation’s efforts to help people in need of wheelchairs, call or e-mail Chris Lewis at cl****@wh******************.org.

Elisabeth Deffner writes from California. Her work has appeared in numerous publications including the Los Angeles Times, the National Catholic Register and Catholic Digest.

david_and_bushWheelchair Foundation President David Behring had the opportunity to meet with President Bush and Laura Bush, along with 14 representatives from other organizations affiliated with providing aid to Iraq and Afghanistan on Tuesday, March 21, 2006 in the Roosevelt Room of the White House.  Some of the topics that were discussed in the meeting follow:

THE PRESIDENT: I want to thank you all for coming. Laura and I have really enjoyed our visit.

We’re talking today to people who have decided to try to help improve the lives of folks in Afghanistan and Iraq. And I just marvel at the fact that Americans from around our country have heard a call to help somebody realize the benefits of freedom. You know, governments can help, and we will help. And obviously, we’ve got a brave military trying to secure freedom in Afghanistan and Iraq. But one of the real powerful parts of developing civil societies in these two countries is the fact that fellow citizens are willing to interface with citizens in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We’ve heard stories about Afghan women education programs and Iraqi Fulbright programs and programs to help hospitals and programs to welcome intellectuals—all aimed at helping these societies that were once brutalized by tyrants realize the great benefits and blessings of liberty. We’ve got—I’m sure a lot of our citizens don’t realize this, but there are thousands of, we call them social entrepreneurs, who are figuring out ways to help improve the human condition in these two liberated countries.

And I want to thank you all very much. It’s heartening to hear your stories and it makes me—once again gives me great reason to be proud of our country and the people who live here. So thank you all for coming. God bless your work.

President Bush sent a thank-you letter to President David Behring which can be viewed by clicking here.