Published in Newburyport Daily News
NEWBURYPORT – Newburyport Five Cents Savings Charitable Foundation recently donated $15,000 to support the Pelican Intervention Fund, which assists with treatment for individuals suffering from drug addiction.
Foundation president Janice C. Morse called The Pelican Intervention Fund “a vital organization to our community which supports individuals and their families on their journeys from addiction to recovery.”
NEWBURYPORT — Elizabeth McCarthy and Kim Keene have seen the suffering caused by addiction up close in their loved ones but they have also seen the healing power that hope can have along the road to recovery.
And in November 2015, McCarthy, Keene and Keene’s husband, Steven — all Newburyport residents — set out to spread that same sense of hope when they co-founded the Pelican Intervention Fund to help provide funding for 12-step, extended-stay recovery programs for men and women struggling with addiction.
Read MoreTHE KEENE FAMILY: 12 Steps in the Right Direction
Kim Keene and her husband, Steve, sit opposite each other at their dining room table with scraps of newspaper clippings and magazine articles spread in between. They sift through the pile recalling all the publications that have featured the Pelican Intervention Fund, the foundation they and Elizabeth McCarthy co-founded.
NON-PROFIT SPOTLIGHT
THE PELICAN INTERVENTION FUND: One Local Response to the Growing Opiate Crisis
By Steven Keene and Elizabeth McCarthy
Kim and I first met “Corey” 15 years ago when we moved to Newburyport. He became friends with our son and was quickly “adopted’ into our family. He was a well-known, popular member of the community and high school. Corey was your typical Newburyport kid: clean cut, hardworking, and on high school sports teams. Imagine our shock and disbelief in late 2014 when one of his friends confided in us that, “If we don’t help Corey get off his drug addiction, he’ll be dead by the end of the year.”