Pasco Times - July 10, 2005
By Seung Min Kim

A host of social help organizations will swap ideas and consider pooling resources.

Bob Loring knows what community collaboration can do: Donated school supplies send a kid to school, ready to learn. An uninsured child can suddenly get a physical. Dozens of toys greet children who may not have otherwise have received Christmas presents.

Loring, the co-chairman of Toys for Tots in east Pasco County, and his cohorts will meet today to help further their vision of giving needy children a hand up to reach the American Dream.

The Fourth Congress of the America Dream Practitioners will meet today at Pasco-Hernando Community College in Dade City to network, swap ideas and determine ways to combine resources to help needy children in Pasco County.

Registration begins at 8:30 a.m. The conference is open to the public.

"If we're going to help anyone, lets help the kids in poverty," Loring said. "This is where we should intervene and come together as a community."

The American Dream team and its affiliated programs link various social service groups, churches and other community organizations to help poor children.

Wiping out the poverty affecting Pasco County children in an era of dwindling resources demands collaboration among community groups, Loring said.

"Each agency is working in its own little worked," he said. "Basically, we need to talk to each other and try to make resources stretch as far as they possible can."

For example, Toys for Tots had distributed notebooks, pencils and other supplies during the back-to-school season. So had Zephyrhills police So the two agencies combined forces to eliminate the duplication.

With a network of groups and agencies working together. organizers hope to put a face on Pasco's poverty by meeting with families. This approach, called STEPS - school tools that empower and promote success - would help the agencies better identify the children's particular needs, Loring said.

Scheduled speakers during the daylong conference include Rep. Ken Littlefield, R-Zephyrhills and County Commissioner Pat Mulieri.

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