Students Formerly from Cavile Place Housing Community Will ‘Come Home’ for Holiday Celebration, Including Food, Fun and New Coats
Fort Worth – Witherite Law Group and 1-800-TruckWreck are partnering with Fort Worth ISD to provide coats for kids as the winter months approach. The coat giveaway will be held on Saturday, December 11, 2021, from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. in the gymnasium at Brighter Outlook, 4910 Dunbar St., Fort Worth, TX. There will be food provided by local vendors, bounce houses, holiday music, and photos with Santa. More than 290 coats will be distributed to youth and young adults from Cavile Place, the iconic Fort Worth housing projects recently torn down. This year’s event will be extra special, as it will bring families back to the community that many of them called home for decades.
“The kids who lived in Cavile Place had to walk to school because they lived too close for buses to be provided,” said Dr. Carlos Walker, director of the Fort Worth ISD Family Action Center. “We saw many kids walking to school in rain, cold and other weather conditions with no coats on. We put out an ask and Witherite Law Group answered the call to provide not only coats but food and other resources needed in the Stop Six community.”
In February, Dallas/Fort Worth experienced a record low temperature – the coldest in North Texas in 72 years; therefore, the protection of a coat is a basic need, like food, water, shelter, and clothing. Children living at or below the poverty line, which is about 22 percent in Tarrant County, are especially vulnerable because they do not readily have access to such resources.
For many years, Witherite Law Group and 1-800-TruckWreck have provided coats for Fort Worth ISD students during the holiday season, donating more than 1500 coats over the years, totaling more than $50,000.
“I am from Fort Worth, and my mom taught school in the Stop Six community. It is a very special place to me and my firm,” said Amy Witherite, founder of Witherite Law Group and 1-800-TruckWreck. “Everybody needs a coat, and we are overjoyed to be able to provide them to help keep kids warm, healthy, and safe from the weather elements this winter. We want our community to know they can depend on us. We’re here to make the communities we serve better.”
Fort Worth ISD Family Acton Center and Witherite Law Group worked with the Fort Worth Housing Solutions and case managers through Urban Strategies Inc. to help identify and register students from the area who need coats. In addition to the coat giveaway, Witherite Law Group and 1-800-TruckWreck recently made sure 1,000 families had turkeys on the table for Thanksgiving. They will also award more than $100,000 in scholarships during the spring of 2022 to students graduating from Dunbar High School.