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By Tom Bailey Jr.
The Commercial Appeal
A Memphis-area pediatric group has raised $10,000 to buy baby beds for needy families.
Pediatrics East Inc. will donate the money to the Neighborhood Christian Center, which screens families in need of cribs and tries to provide them.
Two deaths led to the group's fundraising drive. The first occurred in February, when 6-month-old Donesa Herron burned to death. Donesa slept on a twin bed, without side rails, because her impoverished family did not have a crib in its Binghamton apartment. She fell off the bed onto a floor heater.
When Dr. Carroll Powell, 57, heard what happened to Donesa and learned of a shortage of baby beds among Memphis's poor, she told her fellow pediatricians at Pediatrics East that something had to be done.
Powell died of a heart attack on March 12.
The four-office, 15-doctor pediatric group reacted to her death by creating the Carroll Powell Memorial Fund.
“That's a pretty good sum,” Dr. William C. Threlkeld, president and senior partner of Pediatrics East, said of the $10,000. “We're really pleased with that.”
“And I think the Neighborhood Christian Center is excited too.”
Contributors included the firm, individual doctors, staff, patients and even a Sunday school class, Threlkeld said. “
It didn't take a lot of pushing people to do it,” he said. “They came forth on their own.” Not including the $10,000, the center has received donations for about 115 new baby beds since Donesa's death, said Linda Ballard Webster, who heads the center's hotline/baby bed ministry. Still, about 50 families are on the center waiting list for cribs.
At just over $100 for a crib and mattress, the $10,000 will buy about 95 beds, Webster said. Threlkeld said Powell “just couldn*t believe that children in Shelby County didn't have bed to live in.”
“Apparently that struck nerve with other people, too.”
To reach reporter Tom Bailey Jr., call 529-2388 or E-mail baileytom@gomemphis.com
Dr. William Threlkeld issues $10,000 check to Linda Webster,
hotline manager,
as JoeAnn Ballard, Executive Director, looks on. (Photo courtesy of JoeAnn
Ballard)
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