The Catholic Charities Disability Fund is a program that aids clients with disabilities with disability-related expenses that are not covered by other sources. This program has seen a steady increase in the number of monthly applications. Due to this increase, funding for the program was almost depleted by October of last year.

Even with the shortage of funds, applications kept coming in. The agency’s only option would be to stop helping these individuals until the fund was replenished in February. That meant people in need would go without help for up to four months.

Last year, on Giving Tuesday, the Greater Salina Community Foundation awarded $5,000 to support this program and fill the funding gap. Thanks this grant funding, Catholic Charities was able to continue to help, which was especially life-changing for one man. He had cataracts, which had gotten so bad over time that he was almost legally blind. Although he had Medicare to assist with necessary cataract removal procedure, insurance required his portion be paid before surgery. This gentleman thought he would just have to accept going blind at only 58 years of age. However, he was referred to Catholic Charities and was approved to receive $300 he desperately needed to pay his portion of the cataract procedure.

Catholic Charities said they would not have been able to provide him with this life-changing assistance without the grant funding from the community foundation. The next time he came to Catholic Charities, he simply said, “Look! I can see!”