FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Major Todd Smith 202-756-2602

SALVATION ARMY RECEIVES $25 MILLION GIFT FROM CASEY MANSION FOUNDATION

Gift will be used by The Salvation Army to build and help fund economic development center in Anacostia April 21, 2004 (Washington, DC) – Today, the Casey Mansion Foundation has given a cash gift of 25 million dollars to The Salvation Army National Capital Area. A representative of the foundation informed the Army’s divisional commander, Lt. Colonel William Crabson, of the amount of the gift on Tuesday, April 20. “We are humbled by Mrs. Betty Casey’s generosity,” said Crabson. “This gift will allow The Salvation Army to join other organizations and local partners to change lives and strengthen the community of Anacostia.”

The gift will be used to establish the East of the River Corps Community Center in Anacostia, and also create an endowment to provide ongoing partial funding of programs. The center will provide workforce and economic development for the local community as well as child care and family assistance. In keeping with the Army’s spiritual mission, and understanding that changed hearts can be the key to changed lives, spiritual programs will also be a key part of the center’s service to the community.

In November of 2001, The Salvation Army commissioned a study to determine how best to serve in the District. The study pointed to the communities of Ward 8, where at the time the Army had no local presence. Further research last year led to the current plan to expand the Army’s work in Ward 8 with the construction of a facility and a focus on a comprehensive approach to individual and community economic development. Work has been progressing rapidly on developing the plans for both the facility and the programs. The Army hopes to break ground for the proposed 45,000 square foot building on the corner of Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue and Morris Road in the Spring of 2005.

The gift of $25 million by the Casey Mansion Foundation is the largest The Salvation Army National Capital Area has received. The Eugene B. Casey Foundation, named for Mrs. Casey’s late husband, has helped to support the Army’s work in the national capital area with several significant gifts. In 1990, the foundation underwrote the costs of a new corps community center in Montgomery County. Further gifts have gone towards the construction of the Harbor Light Center, a 136-bed, residential, addiction treatment facility, and the Turning Point Center, a 30-unit apartment complex where homeless mothers can live with their children for up to two years while they receive support and gain the skills to become self sufficient.

Across the National Capital area and the Commonwealth of Virginia, The Salvation Army provides hot meals and food baskets for the hungry, clothing and winter outerwear, shelter for the homeless, seasonal assistance and cheer, character building programs, after school education and recreation program for children from low-income families, companionship to the elderly, and disaster relief. Information on the Army’s work is available online at www.salarmyDC.org.



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