Showalters To Join KidsPeace Trick-Or-Trot 5K To Benefit Local Foster Kids
BALTIMORE (WJZ)—If you're in Canton early Saturday morning, you'll have a chance to "buckle up." Orioles manager Buck Showalter and his wife will join hundreds of people who will be walking and running.
Ron Matz reports it's all for a good cause.
O'Donnell Square will be busy Saturday morning. It's where the third annual Trick-or-Trot 5K begins. The run and walk benefits KidsPeace, a charity which helps foster children.
"On an annual basis, we'll work with 200-300 kids. We teach kids how to write a resume. We teach them how to dress for success. We teach them how to balance a checkbook, basic things they don't get that most kids would get from their family," said Elizabeth Liechty, KidsPeace.
Dawnella Tillman has been a foster parent for five years.
"I've been involved with KidsPeace since 2008. I have had wonderful children in my home. I still have a child that's residing with me," Tillman said.
Orioles manager Buck Showalter and his wife Angela are strong supporters of KidsPeace.
Angela remembers her parents helping foster kids.
"These kids are all great kids. They've been failed somehow, someway. We say change a life today. It's so important. Everybody wants to feel needed and loved. Isn't that the way life is," said Angela Showalter, KidsPeace supporter.
KidsPeace helps children with things we take for granted.
"We establish a program called KEYS, kids empowering youth to succeed," Liechty explained. "It's a curriculum we take our children through, so when they age out they know their strengths and their potential so they don't become a statistic."
A 130-year-old private charity, KidsPeace works with children and teens in the foster care system. The local board works with children in Baltimore and Washington, D.C.
On Saturday the Orioles family will reach out to help children in need.
"The Showalter family, we immerse ourselves. That's the way you have to do things. If you're going to find something to be a part of, you need to have a passion for it," said Angela Showalter.
"It means a whole lot to me," Tillman said. "I have my children, and they accept the kids. It's their home away from home. We're their respite parents when their parents can't be there for them."
Registration begins at 7:30 a.m. Saturday in O'Donnell Square. The KidsPeace race kicks off at 9 a.m.
"It's a fun event. You can bring your pets. Please come out and join us on Saturday. It's support and awareness that makes all the difference in these kids' lives," Liechty said.
For more information about the KidsPeace Trick-or-Trot, click here.
