Lexington coalition joins other charities in benefiting from Flip and Give SC
Columbia, SC (Laurryn Thomas) - A Columbia real estate agency, The Moore Company, unveiled their donation of $100,000 to be divided among five different Midlands charities from the proceeds of their “Flip and Give” property remodel Tuesday at 10:30 a.m. One of those charities, The Midlands Fatherhood Coalition, has an office in Lexington and has stayed busy for years teaching fathers how to become dads. They also focus on how important and involved a father is in the life of a child. Over the years, The Midlands Fatherhood Coalition has helped reconnect and cement the relationships between dads and their children in thousands of families of various makeups in Lexington County and across SC’s Midlands.
The Moore Company used a unique strategy of garnering public attention to the remodel through online voting on the design aspects of the house as well as what charities would be chosen to receive donations. Tuesday, Achieve Columbia received the largest donation from the home sale of $50,000 to use for their organization helping struggling youth.
The top five charities voted on by over 30 thousand online voters were Camp Cole, The Therapy Place, The Women’s Shelter, Midlands Fatherhood Coalition, and lastly Achieve Columbia. Camp Cole helps children and adults with mental and physical illnesses have a fun summer camp experience and received five thousand dollars from the Flip and Give project.
The Therapy Place offers innovative forms of physical, behavioral, and occupational therapies to children with special needs in the Midlands and received seven thousand five hundred dollars.
The Women’s Shelter of Columbia helps those in need of domestic violence shelters, childrens’ shelters, and community housing for special needs adults. The Women’s Shelter was voted on to receive the third highest donation of $12,500.
The Midlands Fatherhood Coalition aims to assist fathers in overcoming challenges in becoming a responsible and effective father to create stronger families and they received $25,000. Again, they have an office in Lexington and have had that presence for a number of years now.
Lastly, Achieve Columbia, is a non-profit that combines working with students, families, and schools for children in middle through high school to help them succeed despite facing developmental problems such as poverty, neglect, or abuse.
Director of Achieve, Robert Lominack, said “we started 6 years ago and the idea is that we work with the students and their families to help address the things that happen outside of school but that impact students in school.”
Lominack said that through continued growth and support from their students and others involved with Achieve is the reason that he believes they gained so much online support to come in first place and receive $50,000.
“From the bathroom layout to the tile choices - everything you see behind us was chosen by the community, we knew that people would be really invested in that, but what we didn’t expect was the level of generosity that the community showed us,” said Moore. Through help and donations from local carpenters, electricians, roofers, and others, the community came together to contribute to Flip and Give. “This was a tremendous labor of love,” said Moore.
The new homeowners are a couple just moving to Columbia from out of state. The home was originally bought for $130,000 and sold for upwards of $500,000. The house was originally built in the 1920’s and started with two bedrooms and one bathroom, but transformed into a four-bedroom, three bathroom, and 1,400 square footage larger home.
To learn more about The Midlands Fatherhood Coalition and their programs, go to their website by clicking this LINK. You can also learn more about the other great programs hat received checks by Googling their names.
