As part of his 10th annual hat and glasses drive, Tom Berndt, an agent affiliated with the Laguna Beach office of Coldwell Banker Realty, collected more than 800 hats for kids, 2,000 reading glasses for adults and 400 new and used sunglasses for Village Hope Core (VHC), an organization dedicated to fostering integrated social and economic development in rural communities. All donated items will be given to orphans and villagers in Mt. Kenya in Chogoria, Kenya.
“Due to the current pandemic, I was worried that we would see a decline in donations, but thankfully that wasn’t the case,” said Berndt. “In just a month, our generous community members donated twice as much as in past drives that lasted six months, which will make a huge difference for the eye health of the Chogoria community, because every donation, cash or items, gets to the people.”
Thanks to Berndt’s fundraising in 2019, every child in the two orphanages in Mt. Kenya received a hat for the first time because they learned a lot of the kids were contracting cataracts due to lack of protection from the high altitude sun, and the majority of the children were also able to receive sunglasses. Because a pair of sunglasses is a status symbol, the adults had priority when it came to sunglasses and are the only ones to receive reading glasses. In some cases, VHC takes needy children to the doctor for prescription glasses.
To learn more about the Village Hope Core, please visit www.villagehopecore.org.
Coldwell Banker Realty in Southern California, the No. 1 residential real estate brokerage in Southern California, operates 61 offices with approximately 4,189 affiliated agents. Real estate agents affiliated with the company are independent contractor agents and are not employees of the company. Coldwell Banker Realty is owned by a subsidiary of Realogy Holdings Corp. (NYSE: RLGY), the largest full-service residential real estate services company in the United States. For more information, visit ColdwellBankerHomes.com. CalDRE #01908304.
