While Ohio University students and alumni participate in a busy Homecoming week, a local bookstore hopes to use increased sales to help the homeless.
This Homecoming weekend, College Book Store will hold its third annual “Homecoming for the Homeless” program, which donates 10 percent of the store’s net weekend profit to Good Works.
The College Book Store donates the portion of its Homecoming proceeds to Good Works, an organization that provides services to people affected by homelessness and poverty in Southeast Ohio. Last year, the bookstore donated $1,000, and it raised $500 the year before.
The bookstore hopes to raise even more money this year, said Andrew Stout, a managing partner at College Book Store, in an email.
“In addition to the monetary donations we give these local organizations, another goal of these events is to help raise awareness for the organizations themselves,” Stout said.
The money will be used to help fund Timothy House, a homeless shelter that is so full that it has had to turn about 100 people away this year, according to a press release from the College Book Store.
The shelter can house 15 people and costs about $180,000 a year to run, according to the release.
Although Timothy House has faced budget cuts, “they are very effective,” saidNick Claussen, community relations coordinator for the Athens County Job & Family Services.
While some statistics like poverty and hunger can be more easily measured based on income or an evident lack of nutrition, the homeless rate can be hard to measure, Claussen said, making it a silent symptom of the recession.
“You don’t see (homeless) people on the street like in a big city; they often move in with another family,” he said. “It seems like we’ve heard stories of people’s families moving in with other families, grandparents moving in, et cetera.”
The Homecoming for the Homeless program does help business, said Kristin Yerecic, the co-account executive for College Bookstore within ImPRessions, a student-run public relations organization.
However, Yerecic added, “(the) main motivation is that since we are the only locally owned bookstore, we like to keep our philanthropy events local.”
College Book Store holds similar events throughout the year. A portion of Sibs Weekend profits go to the local Big Brothers Big Sisters chapter, and on Moms Weekend, a fraction of the bookstore’s proceeds are donated to My Sister’s Place, a local women’s shelter.
In addition to one larger event like the Homecoming one each quarter, the bookstore has smaller programs as well, Stout said.
College Book Store sells Marching 110 T-shirts and clothing with the number 62, which benefit the band’s uniform fund and the Marcellis Williamson Memorial Fund, respectively.
Yerecic said that College Bookstore is also trying to work out another charity partnership with Habitat for Humanity.
ld311710@ohiou.edu
