Community Raises $1M In 10 Years For Riley Families
March 13, 2021 at 2:21 a.m.
Community Raises $1M In 10 Years For Riley Families
By David [email protected]
The two-day event ended at 7 p.m. Friday with Kris Lake, of 107.3 WRSW, announcing that in the 10th year of Riley Radio Days, “We made it! We did it!”
A final figure was not available Friday night as calls were still coming in at 7 p.m., and people can still donate all weekend online at the Monteith’s Best One Tire & Auto Care Online Donation Center at www.1073wrsw.com. But inside the radio station Friday, there were smiles and cheers because of the accomplishment no one expected a decade ago.
“It feels amazing,” KC Riley Kids Fund co-founder Mike Bergen said at the 107.3 WRSW radio station after the milestone was hit. “I never in my wildest dreams thought that we would raise a million dollars in this fund. The credit goes to the community and the families that shared their stories, and then, obviously, the community that made the donations, so it’s not us. It’s Kosciusko County.”
The KC Riley Kids Fund was started in 2011 at the Kosciusko County Community Foundation by Bergen and Alan Alderfer, who both had children that needed care at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis. In 2012, then radio station manager Clint Johnson started the Riley Radio Days to help raise money for the fund.
“Finally, we got to the point where, this year, Mike realized we were within $80,000 of a million,” Alderfer said. “Between ourselves, Mike and I thought maybe we could get that. But as soon as it started, Kris Lake, from WRSW, said, ‘We’re hitting a million dollars this year.’ So he’s the one that pushed us out of our comfort zone.”
Alderfer said he and Bergen have never set a goal for how much they wanted to raise.
“We always said whatever the community wanted to support these families, we were going to help raise. So, from here, we’re going to keep raising money for these families and we’ve never had a goal before. It’s just as long as there are kids going to Riley Children’s Hospital, we’re going to continue to help them,” Alderfer said.
The KC Riley Kids Fund provides support to Riley Hospital and financial assistance to the families of Kosciusko County children who are patients at Riley Hospital.
Bergen said people listening to the families’ stories on the radio station “tend to gravitate to the more poignant stories. The job that Kris Lake has done in producing this and putting them together with the music – that’s the feedback that we’ve been getting, is that it’s so much better with the music. It just sounds so good, and I’ve noticed that, too. I think that’s helped to inspire people to make a donation.”
Alderfer said it’s been an unusual year with the COVID-19 pandemic so, “it is nice that these families can use gas cards or have hotel money. It’s being able to get back and forth (to Riley) and not worry about other bills.”
In 2020, because of the pandemic, Riley Radio Days was postponed from March to July, with only employees of the radio station manning the phone banks. This year, they were able to hold it in March, but still with no community volunteers manning the phone lines.
Alderfer said holding the fundraiser in July 2020 didn’t slow them down at all.
“We raised over $60,000 last July, and here – six, seven, eight months later – we raised another $80,000,” Alderfer said. “This community wants to help these families. This community knows these families, and that is why this has been such a success.”
Now that they’ve reached the $1 million milestone, Bergen said he wasn’t sure where they go from here.
“I don’t know. I have no idea. We’ll have to think about that,” he said. “The bottom line is, as long as there’s a need, then we have to keep doing it, we have to keep raising money.”
At the very beginning, he said he and Alderfer had talked about putting this together and then kind of stepping away and turning it over to the community.
“And in a lot of ways, that’s happened. WRSW has stepped in and they do so much. All the folks at the Community Foundation do so much. Laura at the Help Center does so much. And then, of course, the community in making the donations, all the families. So, I don’t know where we go, but there’s still families from Kosciusko County who need help getting back and forth from Riley, so the work goes on,” Bergen said.
Even though Riley Radio Days is over for 2021, donations toward the KC Riley Kids Fund can still be made at the Community Foundation or through their website at kcfoundation.org.
“Thank you to everyone who has taken part in this. I’ve said this on the air, and, outside of my family, this is the most rewarding thing I’ve ever been a part of,” Bergen said.
The two-day event ended at 7 p.m. Friday with Kris Lake, of 107.3 WRSW, announcing that in the 10th year of Riley Radio Days, “We made it! We did it!”
A final figure was not available Friday night as calls were still coming in at 7 p.m., and people can still donate all weekend online at the Monteith’s Best One Tire & Auto Care Online Donation Center at www.1073wrsw.com. But inside the radio station Friday, there were smiles and cheers because of the accomplishment no one expected a decade ago.
“It feels amazing,” KC Riley Kids Fund co-founder Mike Bergen said at the 107.3 WRSW radio station after the milestone was hit. “I never in my wildest dreams thought that we would raise a million dollars in this fund. The credit goes to the community and the families that shared their stories, and then, obviously, the community that made the donations, so it’s not us. It’s Kosciusko County.”
The KC Riley Kids Fund was started in 2011 at the Kosciusko County Community Foundation by Bergen and Alan Alderfer, who both had children that needed care at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis. In 2012, then radio station manager Clint Johnson started the Riley Radio Days to help raise money for the fund.
“Finally, we got to the point where, this year, Mike realized we were within $80,000 of a million,” Alderfer said. “Between ourselves, Mike and I thought maybe we could get that. But as soon as it started, Kris Lake, from WRSW, said, ‘We’re hitting a million dollars this year.’ So he’s the one that pushed us out of our comfort zone.”
Alderfer said he and Bergen have never set a goal for how much they wanted to raise.
“We always said whatever the community wanted to support these families, we were going to help raise. So, from here, we’re going to keep raising money for these families and we’ve never had a goal before. It’s just as long as there are kids going to Riley Children’s Hospital, we’re going to continue to help them,” Alderfer said.
The KC Riley Kids Fund provides support to Riley Hospital and financial assistance to the families of Kosciusko County children who are patients at Riley Hospital.
Bergen said people listening to the families’ stories on the radio station “tend to gravitate to the more poignant stories. The job that Kris Lake has done in producing this and putting them together with the music – that’s the feedback that we’ve been getting, is that it’s so much better with the music. It just sounds so good, and I’ve noticed that, too. I think that’s helped to inspire people to make a donation.”
Alderfer said it’s been an unusual year with the COVID-19 pandemic so, “it is nice that these families can use gas cards or have hotel money. It’s being able to get back and forth (to Riley) and not worry about other bills.”
In 2020, because of the pandemic, Riley Radio Days was postponed from March to July, with only employees of the radio station manning the phone banks. This year, they were able to hold it in March, but still with no community volunteers manning the phone lines.
Alderfer said holding the fundraiser in July 2020 didn’t slow them down at all.
“We raised over $60,000 last July, and here – six, seven, eight months later – we raised another $80,000,” Alderfer said. “This community wants to help these families. This community knows these families, and that is why this has been such a success.”
Now that they’ve reached the $1 million milestone, Bergen said he wasn’t sure where they go from here.
“I don’t know. I have no idea. We’ll have to think about that,” he said. “The bottom line is, as long as there’s a need, then we have to keep doing it, we have to keep raising money.”
At the very beginning, he said he and Alderfer had talked about putting this together and then kind of stepping away and turning it over to the community.
“And in a lot of ways, that’s happened. WRSW has stepped in and they do so much. All the folks at the Community Foundation do so much. Laura at the Help Center does so much. And then, of course, the community in making the donations, all the families. So, I don’t know where we go, but there’s still families from Kosciusko County who need help getting back and forth from Riley, so the work goes on,” Bergen said.
Even though Riley Radio Days is over for 2021, donations toward the KC Riley Kids Fund can still be made at the Community Foundation or through their website at kcfoundation.org.
“Thank you to everyone who has taken part in this. I’ve said this on the air, and, outside of my family, this is the most rewarding thing I’ve ever been a part of,” Bergen said.
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