NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. (WIVB) — The Niagara Falls City School District announced on Wednesday its new partnership with Sleep in Heavenly Peace to provide children in need with their own beds.
“The need for bedding and a good night’s sleep for our kids is one of the basic needs that everyone needs to have a functional productive day,” said Mark Laurrie, the superintendent of the Niagara Falls City School District. “Knowing that we have about 400 homeless children in the district, and others that are sleeping on couches and pallets, it’s just not right.”
Buffalo’s chapter of Sleep in Heavenly Peace has built and delivered more than 6,200 beds to local children in the past five years. It costs them around $300 to put a bed together. These beds are given to the children for free.
“This is more than just a bed, this is very important to these children, and quite frankly, it’s very important to the adults that are volunteering,” said Jerry Sheldon, the chapter president of Sleep in Heavenly Peace Buffalo. “We’ve given purpose, fellowship, friendship to a lot of folks who made this a big part of their lives, and that’s the reason why we’re so successful.”
People can help show their support in helping build beds for these children by making monetary donations here, donating brand new bedding items like sheets, pillows mattress pads at Bloneva Bond Elementary School in Niagara Falls, and by donating their time by signing up to help build or deliver these beds to their new homes.
Laurrie said they received an anonymous $10,000 check to this partnership. During Wednesday’s press conference, John Cousins, the chapter president for Sleep in Heavenly Peace Tallahassee, donated $10,000 to them as well.
“The stories that we have about these kids, not just that they don’t sleep in a bed, they’re sleeping on a couch, floor, sometimes they’re sleeping on their own clothes or baby pallets,” Cousins said. “I didn’t even know what a baby pallet was — it’s a changing pad. That’s what kids are sleeping on.”
For more information about Sleep in Heavenly Peace, visit its website here. To submit an application for a child to receive a bed, click here.
Email kevin.burgess@shpdbeds.org or jamie.schmidt@shp.org to sign up to volunteer.
Latest Local News
Hope Winter is a reporter and multimedia journalist who has been part of the News 4 team since 2021. See more of her work here.
Want more insights? Join Working Title - our career elevating newsletter and get the future of work delivered weekly.
