FAYETTEVILLE — It was easy for Amy Bates to drop the Elizabeth Richardson Center as a client.
Bates is an event planner, the president of Bates Events. One of her clients was the Elizabeth Richardson Center, which hired her company to plan its annual adult dance, a promlike event for individuals with disabilities in Northwest Arkansas.
Then she was asked to join the center’s board of directors. Normally, Bates would have said no to such a request, but she happily made an exception for the center.
“As an event planner I had made it a rule to never be a part of a board that would make me segregate from other organizations,” says Bates, who lives in Springdale and has been on the center’s board for three years. “ERC was the exception. I thought, ‘You know what? These people needto have other people in the community believe in them.’”
Since 1963, the Elizabeth Richardson Center has worked to improve the quality of life for individuals with disabilities. This assistance takes many forms.
The organization operates child development centers for children between the ages of 6 months and 5 years old in Fayetteville, Springdale, Farmington and Siloam Springs. A fifth center will be opening shortly in Huntsville.
“[The goal is] to be mainstreamed,” Bates says. “The preschools are an amazing place to be; you see that oneon-one therapy and you realize how important it is.”
Some of the center’s clients live in group homes, and Bates has lent her expertise to their decor, meeting with clients and personalizing the paint colors and design styles.
Bates loves interacting with the clients, and says that whenever she attends a meeting at the center’s Springdale headquarters, she makes it a point to visit the people who are working at Richardson Industries. Richardson Industries finds work opportunities for clients, such as organizing the numbers used to display prices at Wal-Mart stores.
“They love having a job,” Bates says. “They love knowing at the end of the day they’ve accomplished something, and they’re so proud. The camaraderie at Richardson Industries is amazing.”
Bates has a love for people with disabilities that spans back to her childhood in Houston. Her mother, Sheryl Farris, was a special education teacher for more than 30 years, and Bates often got involved in the lives of her mother’s students.
“Whenever they would have events, we always went,” Bates says. “My mother taught us, ‘They’re not specialneeds, they’re people who need to be special.’”
Bates came into contact with the Elizabeth Richardson Center when she was asked to plan its adult dance in the mid-2000s. The center wanted something “over the top” for its clients, so Bates Events brought in a DJ and a punch fountain - filled with sugar-free punch, to accommodate diabetics - and the response from clients was tremendous.
She did this for a few years before being asked to join the board.
“Of all the events I do, I’ve never seen the dance floor so packed from the moment you arrive to the moment you leave,” Bates says. “They saved up for limousines and tuxedos and corsages, and it was the most excitement you had ever seen.”
Bates is no longer theplanner of the adult dance, but she’s very excited about a new fundraising event the center will be holding on Friday - the Beach Bingo Bash.
A family-style event, the Beach Bingo Bash will be at the UARK Bowl in Fayetteville, from 6-10 p.m. There will be a band, beverages and hors d’oeuvres.
The event will also include bingo games, and prizes for the winners - as well as prizes that are randomly awarded. Tickets are $40 each, $75 for a couple, and $350 for a table of 10.
Bates has bought a table for the event, and has donated it, so it will be filled by the center’s clients.
“Bingo is something everyone does,” Bates says. “It’s going to be decorated like a beach, and there are going to be great prizes.” For more information about the Elizabeth Richardson Center, call (479) 872-1800 or visit
ercinc.org
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Northwest Profile, Pages 31 on 07/08/2012