Help Us Reach Our Year-End Goal: Join Our Monthly Donor Program!

As we approach the end of the year, we’re excited to share a new way you can support Bridge a Life and help us make a lasting impact on children and families in Circuit 12. We’ve launched our Monthly Donor Progress Tracker, and we need YOUR help to fill it up! 🧩

Every month, your donation will fuel our efforts to provide trauma-informed training and community-building events for families who care for children from hard places. By becoming a monthly donor, you're directly supporting these programs, helping them grow, and expanding their reach throughout the tri-county area.

Why Monthly Giving Matters
Monthly donations are vital to sustaining the work we do. They allow us to plan ahead, knowing we have a consistent stream of support that will continue to make a difference throughout the year. Whether your gift is $10, $25, $50, or more, it adds up and helps us continue offering hope and healing where it's needed most.

We’ve set a goal to fill up our Monthly Donor Progress Tracker by the end of the year, and we’re asking you to join us in reaching that goal. Your donation helps us move one step closer to expanding our programs and services to support even more families.

How It Works
Take a look at our Monthly Donor Progress Tracker below! Every donation fills one of the boxes and brings us closer to our goal. Whether you give $10/month or $50/month, each donation plays a crucial role in ensuring we can continue supporting families.

💙 $10/month: Provides ongoing support for families accessing our community events.
💙 $25/month: Helps families attend trauma-responsive trainings, building the confidence and resources they need.
💙 $50/month: Sends families to our Parents Night Out events, giving parents a chance to relax while kids enjoy a fun evening with trained volunteers.
💙 $100/month: Sends families to Family Camp, strengthening family connections and providing new tools for parenting.

Exclusive Thank You Gift!
As a special thank you for becoming a monthly donor, if you give $50 or more each month, you’ll receive an exclusive 2024 Bridge a Life Giving Tuesday T-shirt! 🎉 This limited-edition shirt is our way of showing appreciation for your continued support and commitment to our mission.

Double Your Impact with Giving Tuesday
If you choose to give this Giving Tuesday, your donation will go even further! The first $5000 donated will be matched by Grace Community Church, which means your gift will have double the impact in helping us reach our goal! 💥

What Your Support Means
Every dollar you give helps us continue providing trauma-informed services and community-building programs for families who need it most. Here’s how your support is making a difference:

• $70 helps four families attend The Gathering, an event that equips them with trauma-informed training.
• $250 helps families enjoy a Parents Night Out, a much-needed break for caregivers.
• $1000 provides four families the opportunity to attend Family Camp, where they’ll deepen connections and build new skills.

Join Us in Making a Difference
As we finish out the year, we hope you’ll join us in reaching our Monthly Donor Progress Tracker goal. Your monthly donation will help us ensure that Bridge a Life can continue offering critical services to children and families in need throughout Circuit 12.

Ready to get started? You can become a monthly donor today and make an immediate impact on the lives of local families. Click here to give and fill one of those boxes on our tracker! https://bridgealife.networkforgood.com/

Thank you for your ongoing support and for believing in our mission. Together, we can continue offering hope and healing to those who need it most. 💙

Last week Bridge a Life received word that we had been selected to receive a grant from the Florida Disaster Relief Fund to assist the families we serve with hurricane recovery.

We were honored to stand alongside other hardworking, compassionate nonprofit partners who, like Bridge a Life, are positioned to quickly and effectively meet the needs of people who have been negatively impacted by these storms.

In the days leading up to Hurricane Milton making landfall, we worked alongside other child welfare agencies to create a shared database of families with whom we engage. This allowed us to streamline our communication efforts after the storm and share the load of touching base with families. Nearly 200 families received a personal call and we are grateful to report that every family made it through the storm safely. Most commonly we heard that power was lost, resulting in all cold food needing to be disposed of. Additionally, many people lost trees, sections of fence, and shingles. Some had more significant damage to their pool cage, roof, or vehicle. Many lost income due to businesses being closed.

We're grateful to have funds available to quickly address the needs of families while pointing them towards sustainable community resources. We understand that FEMA applications and insurance claims take time and we're fortunate to be positioned to help families bridge the gap and stand with them during uncertain times.

Since Hurricane Ian hit in 2022, Bridge a Life has been able to support over 90 individual families in long term recovery efforts. Projects have ranged from contributing towards new roofs to yard cleanups, providing shelter and safety for over 150 children.

Each year the Safe Children Coalition, our region's lead foster care licensing agency, hosts a Giving Breakfast which honors three Champions for Children. These are individuals or agencies that have made significant contributions towards the wellbeing of our community's young people. This week the 2025 breakfast was announced and Bridge a Life was named as the nonprofit partner honoree!

We are delighted to be recognized as a key contributor to our circuit's child welfare community and honored to stand alongside others who make our world a better place for children and families. If you are interested in joining us at the Giving Breakfast, you can learn more here. 

Ever since becoming an official non-profit, the Board of Directors has always held in high regard its responsibility as the "gatekeeper" of Bridge a Life's mission and vision. We have taken our role very seriously over the last decade while doing everything we could to be involved on a daily and detailed basis as each Board Member managed careers in other sectors. Our desire has always been for kids from hard places and their families to have everything they need to be set up for the best outcomes. We have done well through the years but we know there is always room to grow.

With that said, the Board has come to a place that we believe the mission and vision should be entrusted to our FIRST EVER Executive Director, Jody Jester! Jody is in her 9th year with Bridge a Life and has done so much incredible work for us during that time we know how well she'll lead us into a better tomorrow for the children and families we are blessed to serve. It's been a long time coming but we wanted to make sure those who were unaware of this announcement can congratulate Jody the next time you see her.

~ Danny Jones, Bridge a Life Co-Founder and Board Chair

2023 at a glance