School supplies donated to families fighting illnesses

SPECIAL TO THE VINDICATOR Since its launch in January, The Piggyback Foundation of Youngstown has adopted three families with significant medical bills, assisting eight school-age children. One family has a parent with serious heart complications, and another has a 6-year-old battling cancer. The Foundation delivered pens, pencils, crayons, notebooks and a $100 gift card for personalized purchases like shoes, book bags and new clothes to each of the families. The completed bags to be delivered to the children, above, were filled with the variety of supplies, shown below. Funds for the donation were collected during the foundation’s chocolate festival in May and a rummage sale in June. The Foundation also will be sponsored by a Mercy Health Physicians golf outing planned on Friday. A beer and hard cider tasting fundraiser is planned for Oct. 16 at Magic Tree in Boardman, featuring auctions, raffles and football. For information on the Foundation or to buy tickets for the tasting fundraiser, go to www.piggybackyoungstown.com.