Hearts to Homes thanks CBS News for covering our story and highlighting the impact our services make! Happy National Foster Care Month!

National Foster Care Month is an opportunity for us to celebrate foster youth and the people who provide them with love and support. Please join Hearts to Homes as we launch our May 2023 challenge to raise $30,000 to furnish 12-15 new homes – and build futures, one apartment at a time.
Every dollar donated will help provide the essentials to furnish a first apartment and support a young adult leaving foster care. Whether your donation helps purchase pots and pans, a comforter, a shower curtain or a coffee table – you will be helping create a stable, healthy home.
When we help provide the essentials to furnish a first apartment for these young adults, we help them create a space of their own – and improve the odds that they remain in their apartments, in school or employed, and parenting their children.
Join us in helping young adults aging out of foster care make a fresh start. We have the opportunity to receive a $15,000 match when we raise the first $15,000 in GoFundMe donations! Visit our GoFundMe link to make a donation today https://gofund.me/cb092217
The need for our services is greater than ever – hundreds of young adults aged 18-21 years of age will transition out of foster care in the NYC area this year (our geographic coverage includes Westchester, Rockland, Putnam, Nassau, and Suffolk). Most leave foster care with few possessions and no family to help them make this transition.
Of course, you can also donate right here on our website – www.heartstohomes.org/donate/
Or, you can “buy a bundle” of the most requested household necessities for our next foster youth aging out – www.heartstohomes.org/current-campaigns/
You can also find us on Venmo @Hearts_to_Homes and make your donation there!
Thank you for your interest and support!
We are pleased to announce that Hearts to Homes has provided over $1 million dollars in furnishing assistance to over 450 young adults who have aged out of foster care in New York City, Westchester, Rockland, Putnam, Nassau, and Suffolk counties. The average cost to furnish an apartment and provide essential home furnishings for a living room, bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom is $2,400. Hearts to Homes’ support has followed young New Yorkers, who have chosen to relocate, to Texas, Louisiana, New Jersey, and Connecticut as well as several counties in upstate New York.
Begun as a program of Cardinal McCloskey Community Services, Hearts to Homes provided furnishings for six young adults in 2016. By November 2017, Hearts to Homes had separately incorporated to facilitate expansion of our services to qualified youth at additional foster care agencies.
Since then, Hearts to Homes has expanded our referral program from a single agency to twenty-six referring partners – all of which are either foster care agencies or organizations whose missions are to support foster youth. Today, Hearts to Homes continues to expand services and referral criteria so that more and more young adults in need will be able to avail themselves of this critical support. In 2023, Hearts to Homes expects to furnish 140 apartments for young adults in need.
Our mission is focused on assisting youth at a critical moment in their lives – when they move from foster care to their first, independent apartment. Statistics show that Hearts to Homes’ support is one of the factors that reduces the chance of homelessness, incarceration or inter-generational foster care, instead resulting in more young people remaining stable in their first homes.
Hearts to Homes is indebted to the many donors who have made this possible and to our volunteers and referring partners who work with us each week to make a difference in the lives of these young people!
Sometimes, Hearts to Homes supports more than just an individual aging out of foster care. One-third of young adults are pregnant or parenting when they are referred to us for assistance.
Our goal is to help these families stay together – we have even enabled a family reunification – by supplying everything needed for a safe and complete home. In fact, with your help, we’re supporting more families each year – 19 families in 2020, 26 in 2021, and 29 families in 2022.
Overall, that means that your support has helped to furnish the homes of over 145 infants, toddlers and young children, making their home a safer, more comfortable place to grow and thrive!
Currently in 2023, 83% of our parents are stable and living with their children. In one study, only about half of children born to a mother in foster care remained out of foster care by age two. Does providing a safe and comfortably furnished home help to keep these young parents more stable? We would certainly like to think so. The cost of caring for a child in foster care has a terrible emotional cost and can average $50,000 per year.
Through providing furnishing and living necessities for our recipients, at an average cost of $2,310 per family, we are part of a system of support that promotes stability. With your help, Hearts to Homes aims to keep families together and end the cycle of foster care. Because we all know, we are better when we are together.
Hearts to Homes is pleased to announce a partnership with CASA-NYC. Family court judges assign CASA-NYC volunteers to the most complex cases for young people involved in the NYC child welfare system. These volunteers work diligently to provide individualized attention to each child, ensuring their needs are protected and rights addressed while helping them navigate the maze of the NYC foster care system. They work to ensure that children in foster care are moved quickly into safe, stable, nurturing, and permanent homes – with their families of origin whenever possible. We welcome CASA-NYC as the 27th referring partner in our Hearts to Homes family.
Hearts to Homes is pleased to welcome, and introduce to our donors, four new members of our Board of Directors. Each of these individuals brings a commitment to philanthropy and to our mission to help foster youth make a smoother transition from foster care to independence. We look forward to working with them as we continue our work in New York City, Westchester, Nassau, Suffolk, Rockland and Putnam counties.
Gloria Dios is a Financial Advisor and lives between Southampton and NYC. She graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she studied Film & TV and minored in business. After graduation, she worked as a casting producer and editor for various reality TV shows. Growing up the daughter of two financial advisors, she developed a passion for educating and helping others with financial literacy which led to her career change. She is on the Southampton Village Business Revitalization committee and a board member for Heart of the Hamptons, a food pantry and general assistance nonprofit in Southampton.
Jan Jason joined the Hearts to Homes board after fifteen years at the Rockland County Department of Social Services where she served as Coordinator of Operations, Analysis and Planning. Her experience consisted of collaborating with management and supervisory staff on program administration including children and family services, child welfare, and adult services, as well as benefits programs. In her previous position as assistant to the Commissioner of Social Services, she served as liaison with government agencies, community organizations, and county departments to increase collaborative efforts and maximize resources to benefit clients. Jan retired in 2017 and since then has volunteered as a board member of Child Care Resources of Rockland, as a classroom aide in the East Ramapo, NY Early Childhood Learning Center, with the Soup Angels Food Program in Nyack, NY, and as a Surrogate Decision-Making Committee Member with the NYS Justice Center for the Protection of People with Special Needs.
Mary is a graduate of Fordham University and Iona University and a long-time Westchester resident who currently lives in Mamaroneck. She spent her career in financial services and retired from UBS after 25 years. Supporting local organizations is important to Mary, her husband John, and their two adult children. Mary served on the board of the YWCA of White Plains and Central Westchester for over ten years, and recently as board secretary. The opportunity to empower young adults attracted Mary to Hearts to Homes.
Allison Reich is an advertising professional working as a Group Copy Supervisor at a Havas Group agency. She is a graduate of Lafayette College where she studied English and Studio Art. Her lifelong passion for contributing to her community and creating a better world through enacting change has led to volunteer work with local and national nonprofit organizations focused on the arts, health, and social causes. Allison previously served on the Junior Committee of Hearts to Homes, and she is thrilled to continue supporting young adults starting their lives outside of the foster care system as a member of the Board of Directors.
On Wednesday, October 12, NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt featured the story of Christina Abraham, a young woman who received Hearts to Homes furnishing support this past August. Watch the report to learn more about the impact your donation makes!
Part 1 and Part 2 of NBC Nightly News Films give a more in-depth look into the process of aging out and Hearts to Homes’ program for assistance.
Unprotected: Aging out of foster care (Part 1)
Unprotected: Aging out of foster care (Part 2)
Our thanks for the treasure, time, and talents of Debbra Stolarik and Patrick Dolan, two Hearts to Homes board members who have finished their term. Their efforts on behalf of foster youth helped us expand our support to youth at twenty-six organizations. Our mission would not have had this growth without their amazing leadership!
Right: As a board member, Patrick Dolan took leadership of several special events, bringing them to higher heights! We are indebted to him for his concern for the young adults we support, his thoughtfulness in board discussions, and his willingness to take on new experiences. He will be a tough act to follow!
Thank you for sharing your compassion, your generosity, and your leadership with Hearts to Homes!
Hearts to Homes is pleased to announce two new partnerships which are helping us expand our services geographically to more individuals in need!
NAFI New York is a multi-service agency that has provided programming and individualized support services to youth and families, since 2005, in a variety of settings across New York State. In this case, this partnership is the direct result of an expansion of services to Putnam County! NAFI’s core services include foster care, wraparound programming, and ground-breaking, evidence-based services for families in their homes and communities.
Family & Children’s Association (FCA) is a non-sectarian, not-for-profit that is dedicated to providing help and hope to Long Island’s most vulnerable children, families, seniors, and communities. We are pleased to be supporting young adults who are part of FCA’s Project Independence. This new partnership has led to the furnishing of our first home in Suffolk County!
We welcome NAFI and FCA as the 25th and 26th referring partner in our Hearts to Homes family.