By Marc Lucarini
CCC Journalism Program
BLACKWOOD – The Ronald McDonald House is asking for your assistance and donation. From now until the end of November, you are asked to collect can tabs for the Pull Tab Collection Program.
This charity event, which started in 1987, benefits the Ronald McDonald House to help pay for the utilities and necessities to serve its families and patients.
The house provides places for the families of sick patients to stay. The home away from home provides 300 Ronald McDonald Houses in 30 counties offering 7,200 rooms to families around the world, saving them $257 million in hotel costs.
The foundation is asking for your donation of collecting as many can tabs as you can. A pop tab is approximately 1 inch long, which is not hard to store, and 1,267 tabs make one pound and will provide 40 cents to the house. If you save $500 you get a Certification of Acknowledgement, save $1,000 you receive a visit from the house representative with gifts, and $5,000 you get a visit from Ronald McDonald and gifts for your class or family.
The first house opened in Philadelphia, Pa., in 1974, when former Philadelphia Eagles player Fred Hill and his wife stayed in hotel rooms while their daughter was treated for leukemia.
The Hills opened the first Ronald McDonald House to meet the needs of families whose children were receiving long-term treatment away from Home. The Hills, along with the Eagles management and Dr. Audrey Evans, created a “home away from home” for families being treated at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
You can drop off your saved tabs to your local Ronald McDonald House between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. or take the tabs to an aluminum recycler and send the check to the Ronald McDonald Foundation.