This is a wonderful time of the year, full of family and friends, celebrations of faith and celebrations in general. It’s especially magical for our children. However, in today’s tough economy, not every family has the means to make this holiday magical. In this week’s Feel Good Friday: local law firm helps Santa; Blue Santa, to be exact.
This is a wonderful time of the year, full of family and friends, celebrations of faith and celebrations in general. It’s especially magical for our children. However, in today’s tough economy, not every family has the means to make this holiday magical. In this week’s Feel Good Friday: local law firm helps Santa; Blue Santa, to be exact.
Operation Blue Santa is a wonderful organization dedicated to helping families during the holiday season. Here is a bit of history on the organization from its website:
“Austin Police Operation Blue Santa has been a program for the Austin Police Department since 1972. This charitable outreach began when two patrol officers realized that some families on their patrol beat would not have gifts or food for their children at Christmas.
What began with gift distributions to 20 families from the back of a patrol car has become a massive effort in partnership with the Austin Fire Department, Austin Energy, Austin Water Utilities, and the Texas National Guard.
Each year, Austin Police Operation Blue Santa serves more than 3,800 families, with 17,000 children in those families receiving gifts. In the past few years our numbers have increased to over 5,000 families and over 20,000 children due to some additional areas of families we are now assisting with. The community is generous in their support, contributing to many events, including the Chuy’s Children Giving to Children Parade, held the Saturday after Thanksgiving each year. All the toys collected during the parade are donated to Austin Police Operation Blue Santa.
Austin Police Operation Blue Santa provides toys & food for families in need during the Holiday Season.”
Such a wonderful thing to do!
One local Austin law firm, Justinian & Associates, volunteered to help Santa make the holidays magical by donating to Operation Blue Santa. The firm, dedicated not just to serving its clients but also to serving the community in which it does business, set out to collect toys to donate. Justinian Lane, the firm’s owner, matched employee donations, doubling the number of gifts donated.
Cody Childress, the firm’s Community Relations Manager, said the original intent was to donate bicycles as they were highly-requested items. After speaking with the officers at Operation Blue Santa, he found that “they got a huge donation of bikes, but no safety gear.” Knowing that safety is important (after all, Justinian & Associates handles a lot of personal injury cases), Cody set out to fill that need. In addition to toys, the firm donated quite a few safety helmets, so the kids who get bikes from Operation Blue Santa can enjoy them safely. That’s what I call a law firm with heart!
We report on a lot of difficult subjects, which is one of the reasons we started doing “Feel Good Friday” posts. Another reason is that we want to recognize the good works that lawyers do outside of their offices and the courtroom. At this time of year, what could be better than giving the gift of joy to local children who may not otherwise have gifts to open? And giving the gift of safety and protection, too? In my opinion, Santa had some amazing helpers this year in the team at Justinian & Associates.
It’s my pleasure to share this wonderful holiday story and to applaud these generous people for caring and giving back to their community. Well done, Justinian & Associates!
I also want to wish our loyal readers the happiest and safest holidays from all of us at Legal Reader! We appreciate your support and look forward to continuing to provide you the best in legal commentary in 2017!
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