Keller Williams Scarsdale Associates Devote a Day to Community Service, Donating Blood and Making Dreams Come True for Kids in Need

Sixth Annual “RED Day” Fulfilled Dreams for Bronx Kids; Donated Blood

Part of community service initiative across the globe

More than 100 Keller Williams associates  from the Scarsdale and Bronx offices took a day off recently, but it was hardly  a day of rest. The Associates chose to “Give Where They Live” as part of RED Day, the company's annual day of service, dedicated to renewing, energizing, and donating (RED) to their local communities.

As part of the RED Day effort, the associates chose to spend the day making dreams come true for 90 kids from the Phipps Neighborhood Transitional Housing Facility homeless shelter near their office in the Bronx. The kids had submitted dream catchers, wish lists, of gifts they wanted and the 80 associates fulfilled their wishes by buying the gifts and presenting them to the kids. An additional 75 children who hadn’t submitted specific wish lists were treated to gifts as well.

While the Bronx team served kids, the Scarsdale Keller Williams office decided to partner with the Westchester office of the New York Blood Center for a blood drive. Thirty-seven associate signed up to donate and 32 pints were collected. Several other agents volunteered to give blood, but most were unable to do so because of donation restrictions such as recent visits to certain countries or previous health conditions. Of that group, fifteen agreed to provide blood at a future date. The blood drive turned out to be an interesting experience for the Realtors, who discovered that there was much more to the process of donating blood than they realized. "I had no idea that going abroad for vacation would have prevented me from giving blood," said Johan Tola, associate real estate broker, Keller Williams Realty Group, "but I can do so next year."
 
The dream catcher project and the blood drive were only the latest community volunteer programs in which the Keller Williams Realty Scarsdale team participated. In previous years, the team has cleaned up a local lake, assisted at a local senior citizens center, and have continued the tradition started four years ago by its corporate parent.   

"RED Day is built on the belief that people can and should come together to achieve extraordinary things to help others," said Team Leader Jamal Hadi, principal broker, Keller Williams, Scarsdale and the Bronx.  “We can’t tell you what an impact it made on each of us personally to fulfill these kids’ wishes and to alleviate the shortage of blood in Westchester County. We all know that filling all the gaps in our communities can't be accomplished by serving just once a year. RED Day just happens to be the one-day expression of the ongoing state of the Keller Williams culture. We see a need, discover who can meet it and get it done.”

Since the first RED Day in 2009, Keller Williams associates have given almost a half million hours of community service through activities ranging from food and blood drives to cleaning up trash in public parks, revamping gardens at nursing homes and rebuilding homes and schools for community members in need. To this day, it is one of the largest events in the real estate industry. For more information about RED Day, visit (www.kw.com/redday.)

About Keller Williams Realty, Inc.:
Keller Williams Realty, Inc. is the largest real estate franchise company in North America, with approximately 700 offices and almost 100,000 associates in more than a dozen countries around the world. The company has grown exponentially since the opening of the first Keller Williams Realty office in 1983, and continues to cultivate an agent-centric, education-based, technology-driven culture that rewards associates as stakeholders. The company also provides specialized agents in luxury homes and commercial real estate properties. For more information or to search for homes for sale visit Keller Williams Realty online at (www.kw.com). For more information, please visit kwworldwide.com.