Cops, Elks and Community help Haverstraw boy get wheelchair
- September
- 16
Alario Magana got his new wheels on Saturday and gets to celebrate with his benefactors on Thursday evening at the Elk’s Club in Haverstraw village.
The 11-year-old Haverstraw village boy has Cerebral Palsey and gets around the village, the Farley Middle School and his home in a wheelchair.
His old wheelchair was falling part, held together by wire ties, screws and bolts.
Magana takes a bus to school. A Haverstraw Transit bus employee told Haverstraw Detective Charles Hatala about the state of the youngster’s wheelchair. The family insurance company told the boy’s mother that he was not eligible for another chair for a few more years, Hatala told The Journal-News today.
Hatala got the Haverstraw Policemen’s Benevolent Association involved and fund-raising started.
“Kids his age grow leaps and bounds and he would soon grow out of his old chair, which was run-down to begin with,” Hatala said.”We didn’t have $7,000 for a new wheelchair.”
The PBA held a fund raiser, “Friends of Alario,” during the spring. The Elk’s Club learned about Magana’s plight and the PBA effort. The club donated the $7,000 for the wheelchair, Hatala said. The money raised by the PBA then went for a lift, clothes and other needs.
Hatala said helping the youngster was a community effort.
“Joe Marina, from the North Rockland School District helped organizing and shopping for the chair,” Hatala said. ” When I spoke with him .. he told me Alario was very excited about his chair and Tom Brown from the bus company told me he sits so much straigher in the chair.”
At 5 p.m. Thursday, congratulations and thank yous will be exchanged at the Elk’s Club.
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