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Hosting a gala to benefit
homeless services in Palm Beach County has officially become
a mayoral tradition. Palm Beach County Mayor Mary Lou
Berger just announced there will be a Mayor’s Ball in 2016,
and like the preceding balls, it will benefit the Homeless
Coalition of Palm Beach County.
“If you don’t have a place to
live you cannot start to put the rest of your life back
together,” said Mayor Berger. “You need to be in a place
where you feel safe, that you can come home to everyday.
Then you feel like you have re-joined society and you have
a purpose and you’re ready to move on,” Berger continued.
Mayor Berger says she
remembers the shock she felt as a young person the first
time she saw someone living on the street. Berger says the
image of that man stays with her as she and other county
leaders look for ways to solve what she says is one of the
community’s biggest issues.
The Mayor’s Ball began in 2014
when then Mayor Priscilla Taylor decided to hold an event to
increase awareness about homelessness and raise funds to
solve the issue inour
community. Those efforts were continued
in 2015 when Commissioner Shelley Vana served as mayor.
Both mayors selected the Homeless Coalition as the
fundraiser’s beneficiary. Proceeds from the balls have
helped to move 583 men, women and children into permanent
housing and to employ a specialist to identify affordable
housing across the county.
“The Mayor’s Ball is not about
one organization or one city” said Pamela Goodman,Homeless
Coalition Board President and co-chair of the host
committee. “This event has helped fund programs at our
partner agencies, like Adopt-A-Family, Goodwill, The Lord’s
Place and the Senator Philip D. Lewis Center. The Mayor’s
Ball benefits all people who are experiencing homelessness,
in all the municipalities of Palm Beach County,” Goodman
continued.
The theme of this year’s ball
“Be Inspired” encourages guests to create change in
our community, “I would love to have everybody have a place
to live, have a job, be happy, have family,” Mayor Berger
said. “It’s such a Norman Rockwell picture, but if we could
create it just think of how great that would be,” said
Berger.
The Mayor’s Ball 2016 is Saturday,
February 27, 2016 at
the Palm Beach County Convention Center. The black tie gala
will include a cocktail reception and silent auction at 6PM,
followed by dinner and dancing. Tickets are available for
$250 through the Homeless Coalition’s website www.homelesscoalitionpbc.org
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The Homeless Coalition
For over 25 years, the Homeless Coalition's
purpose has been to generate awareness through advocacy,
education and community outreach and to motivate a
community-wide response to raise funding, resources,
partners and involved citizens to end homelessness in Palm
Beach County.
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