5/19/2006 3:03:00 PM -0400
Consumer Health
Caregiving: Who steals a wheelchair? -- 2
By ALEX CUKAN
UPI Health Correspondent
ALBANY, N.Y., May 19 (UPI) -
EXCERPT
One non-profit organization in Indianapolis has been making an effort to help those whose wheelchairs have been stolen -- or who simply can't afford one.
"'LifeNets: The Wheelchair Project' is a non-profit organization that accepts donated wheelchairs -- we provide the donor with a tax deduction -- and we try to match the chair donation with a person who needs one in the same area," Beverly Kubik told UPI's Caregiving.
"My husband, a Rotarian, took this project over about six years ago after a young man working to become an Eagle Scout had set up it up as a project."
Kubik said the group (lifenets.org/wheelchair) can ship manual wheelchairs within the continental United States, but motorized wheelchairs are heavy and difficult to ship, so they try to connect the donor and the recipient within the same area.
"Some of the wheelchairs donated are very expensive -- one was $17,000 and another was $35,000."
Since The Wheelchair Project has been on the Internet its requests for wheelchairs have outnumbered donations; it has applied to the Christopher Reeve Foundation for a grant to hire part-time help.