HALO's annual ArtReach Auction will celebrate a special milestone for the local nonprofit - 15 years of growth.
The 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization supports homeless and at-risk children, with branches in Jefferson City; Kansas City; New York City; and Portland, Oregon, and a global reach. The organization's 12th annual ArtReach Auction is set for 5:30 p.m. March 6 at Capital Bluffs Event Center, 1616 Oil Well Road.
The ArtReach Auction showcases artwork created by the HALO girls home youth and locally and nationally recognized artists. Joyce Neuenswander, support manager for HALO, said the event will start with a silent auction with items donated by local businesses. Dinner will begin at 7 p.m. with beer and wine, and the silent auction closing a little before 8 p.m., when the program and live auction will begin. The Norm Ruebling Band will provide entertainment at the event, and HALO will honor its 2020 award winners.
"This year is really special because we're celebrating our 15-year anniversary," Neuenswander said. "Over the years, we've helped thousands of kids so it's kind of a celebration for us to look back and see where the kids have come from and where they are now."
Rebecca Rademan will receive the nonprofit's Advocate Award. Lisa Washburn will receive the Volunteer Award for the girls home and the Host Lions Club will receive the award for the boy's house. Clyde and Sue Lear will receive the Supporter Award.
"HALO believes that every child should have the support of a family," Neuenswander said. "We provide housing, healing and education to at-risk and homeless children. Our mission is to help one more child spend one less day alone."
She added the local girls home housed 40 this past year and the organization has also started a boys house, which provides after-school programs, including mentoring and tutoring, and hot meals to at-risk boys in the area.
"They don't actually live there, but the programs that we are providing them still fall in the mission of what we're doing," Neuenswander said.
The boys will come from Capital City and Jefferson City high schools, Neuenswander said, and part of the event's proceeds will go toward the purchase of a van to transport the children.
The live auction will include several items made by those in the girls home, including cutting boards made through the HALO Makers program, a table and a large heart made from scraps leftover from the construction of Capital City High School and those collected from the aftermath of the May tornado that hit Jefferson City.
The silent auction will also feature a watercolor painting from Kansas City artist and HALO House volunteer Carly Rae Robinson she created while on stage at the organization's first INSPIRE Women's Conference in September.
Part of the program also will include a spoken word performance from a HALO girls home alumna who is now a student at the University of Missouri.
"That will bring the house down," Neuenswander said. "We are changing lives and it's because of people in our community that support HALO."
Tickets cost $75 each and can be purchased at haloworldwide.org/jeff-city. Proceeds from the event will benefit the local nonprofit office and its programs, as well as provide support for HALO's international programs.
"We work wherever kids who have been abused, abandoned and orphaned, need to feel loved," HALO Founder and CEO Rebecca Welsh said in a news release. "Join us on March 6 to give some love at our most important event of the year, so we can work to help one more child spend one less day alone."