Furniture Bank, Star Furniture team up to help storm victims

From Star Furniture
Oct. 27, 2008, 11:51AM
Star Furniture is teaming up with The Furniture Bank of Houston to help Hurricane Ike victims rebuild their lives.
Star Furniture will collect furniture donations outside of its Houston-area locations 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Nov. 8. The Furniture Bank, 2100 Hussion St., will work with area human service agencies and charities to distribute the donations to families who’ve lost their belongings in the hurricane.
“We are happy to do whatever we can to help our community,” Star Furniture Advertising Director Mike Galloway said. “Having been in Houston since 1912, we’re all family in that regard.”
The Furniture Bank is looking forward to working with Star Furniture to help families in need, said Oli Mohammed, The Furniture Bank’s founder and executive director. “Nobody thinks about furniture after a disaster,” Mohammed said. “Food, clothing: people think of that.”
While hurricane victims can use furniture of any kind, they especially need beds, dinning room tables with chairs and dressers, Mohammed said. “Without a bed, a dining room table and a dresser to put clothing in, life gets very difficult,” he said.
Todd Sweeney would agree. He spent more than a month living in shelters after Hurricane Ike forced him out of his Port Bolivar home. In mid-October, after Sweeney re-located to a Houston apartment, The Furniture Bank gave him a new start.
“It makes a world of difference,” Sweeney said. “We’re ecstatic.”
Volunteer Gerry Lang of the Bolivar Peninsula has been working with St. Matthew’s United Methodist Church of High Island to identify area residents like Sweeney who can benefit from the Nov. 8 furniture drive.
“If you can give someone some normalcy, something to sleep on, something to eat on, it gives people a shot at life again,” Lang said.
Star Furniture will be accepting furniture at the following sites Nov. 8:
7111 FM 1960 W., 281-586-1900
6868 Southwest Freeway, 713-781-7200
19660 U.S. 59-Sugar Land, 281-342-7827
I-45 at NASA Road 1, Webster, 281-338-2471
16666 Barker Springs Road, 281-492-5494
16515 North Freeway, 713-695-7827
Those who cannot participate Nov. 8 still can make a positive difference, Mohammed said. “Any day they want to bring in furniture, they can call The Furniture Bank, and a truck will pick it up,” he said.
To schedule a donation, call 713-842-9771 or 832-863-1996.
The Furniture Bank, an independent, nonprofit agency, collects and distributes furniture free of charge to people in need that have received housing assistance through a social service agency or charity.
For more information, e-mail oli@fb-houston.org.