Out of attorney’s family tragedy comes hope for others
Tragedy struck the family of Manuel S. yatooma on March 11, 1993. Ten years later, on Father’s Day 2003, the formation of Yatooma’s Foundation For the Kids was announced to give hope to other families faced with tragedy.
Norman Yatooma, the eldest of four sons, was 20 and away at college when his father was violently murdered during a carjacking.
Yatooma, an attorney with Norman Yatooma & Associates, founded Yatooma’s Foundation For the Kids.
It was the grief and hardship that his family – his mother, then 45, brothers Jeff, 14, Greg, 13, and Christopher, 11 – would have to endure over the following years that would develop into this desire to help children and their families when one or both parents are lost.
The services offered by For the Kids for these children and their families include direct financial support, as well as professional grief counseling, legal services, accounting services, job placement, scholarships, tutoring, vocational training, mentoring, household services including grocery shopping, lawn maintenance, and more.
“There are kids of all ages, reaces and religions and for all of them one day mom and dad are alive and the next mom and/or dad are gone and there’s a lot of questions that need answering, a lot of things that need doing,” Yatooma said.
Yatooma’s Foundation For the Kids presents The 2nd Annual Champions For The Kids two-day fund-raising event. The foundation will host a VIP Dinner & Auction at the Townsend Hotel on Sunday, July 29, and a day of golf at Oakland Hills Country Club in Bloomfield Hills on Monday, July 30.
The auction will include such items as trips to St. Andrews, Hawaii, Cancun, and Naples. It will also offer a chance to bid on a “fighter jet experience,” a recruiting trip with Michigan State University’s basketball Coach Tom Izzo, and a myriad of other things from event sponsors that include Ticketmaster. Other sponsors include WJR, Michigan State University, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Prototype Systems, Charity Motors, Turtle Lake, The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Quicken Loans and Vision U.
Even those not attending the VIP dinner and auction may bid on the items at www.forthekidsfoundation.org.
“Last year’s event went extraordinarily well,” Yatooma said. “This year’s event is bigger and better in a lot of ways – we not only have Mike Fezzey, who chairs our advisory board along with WJR, but Jimmy Hoffa, president of the Teamsters, has come on as an honorary chairman, and of course there is nobody in contemporary history who has more notoriously lost their father than him and few people understand what it’s like to grow up without a dad and he’s experienced a lot of unique struggles growing up without a father.
“We’ve got a lot of folks that have really stepped up.”
Since its inception the foundation has helped nearly 400 kids and their families.
Sharmon Wood’s three nieces were among those the foundation has reached out and helped with grief counseling assistance.
Wood’s sister was the victim of domestic violence in March 2006, and she left three daughters ages 12, 6 and 5. Their father was in jail and on trial for the murder when the girls were placed with their Aunt Sharmon. Their father has since been convicted of the crime.
“They gave the girls a big Christmas that year,” Woods said. “They got clothes, games, so much stuff – that took care of things for like a year. The girls are still wearing that stuff.”
According to Woods, the girls are doing better than when they initially lost their mother, but sometimes it’s hard.
“Taking care of the girls has changed my whole life,” she said. Woods has two adult children and a nine year old of her own. “It’s hard, but the Lord made a way so I can take care of them and the Yatooma Foundation was such a blessing. It’s a blessing to have someone there to care for children the way they do.”
“Truly all things do work together for the good of those who love God,” Yatooma said. “For our part, my Dad did a lot in his lifetime to help people who were less fortunate. He was something of the traditional American Dream story: He came over on a boat when he was two years old with his dad and running a convenience store downtown at age 14, and ultimately turned into a real success and just like that it was over and he was gone. So it’s an honor for me to participate in an organization that provides the same kind of assistance in Dad’s name in his death that he provided in his lifetime. It’s a way of keeping his spirit alive.”
For more information or to register for the 2nd annual Campions For The Kids fund-raising event, call 1-888-987-KIDS (5437) or visit the foundation’s Web side at www.forthekidsfoundation.org.
