The HeliOS Project is now.....

The HeliOS Project is now.....
Same mission, same folks...just a different name

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Wednesday, February 22, 2017

And the hits just keep on comin'.....

Great news in the mail box last week.

The city of Taylor has decided that they can no longer pay the utilities for the Reglue shop, so effective this month, we have an additional $260.00 to tack onto the monthly outgoing ledger.

That comes on the tail of the abysmal response to our annual fund raiser. We started it a month and a half ago, thinking that 60 days would be plenty of time to raise the money we need for the next year.

That's what I get for thinking when I ain't used to it.

Don't get me wrong. We absolutely love the folks that have supported us. I can never tell you how much I appreciate what you have done for us.

So here's where we stand. Grants that offer cash to use for day to day operational costs just do not exist any longer. Not in the amounts that are needed to keep Reglue afloat. $100.00 here, $300.00 there...and even those come with some substantially thick strings, such as money not to be used to reimburse volunteer's gasoline costs. So, except for the first couple of years, when I ran my organization from an injury claim, The Linux and Greater Free Software communities have supported us, and to this point, you folks have carried us through and allowed us to do the work we set out to do. And to this point, we have given you huge returns on your investments, having placed well over 1600 computers to disadvantaged kids in the past decade.

I've always been driven by the philosophy to find what I love to do and do it to the best of my ability and nothing but my very best is acceptable. I've lived up to that philosophy for 40 years, but now, this love affair with Reglue has hit rocky shores. So much that I've begun the mechanisms to close our non profit down. It will happen in stages over the next 16 months, but it will happen and I cannot justify putting my heart and soul into something that looks as if it might be on life support. Obviously there are more important things than providing computers to financially-disadvantaged kids. Obviously.

With this new monthly addition in outgoing funds, I don't see us lasting for more than 24 months as of now. Our Indiegogo campaign has 11 days to go and we've only reached just over 20% of the money we'll need, so to my mind, things are looking bleak. And as a reminder, we still have $400.00 left that will be matched by a generous donor. So the next $400.00 in donations will be matched.

For those who wish to donate with means other than Indiegogo, you can click on paypal.me/reglue. That will open a tab so you can make a donation directly to our paypal account.

You folks have been a great support system and it hurts me that we have to exit in this manner, but as one of my most hated phrases go, "It is what it is".

Indeed.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tossed another donation your way Ken, I'm sorry that I've not been able to do more. :(

Unknown said...

You rock man. hundreds of times. You've saved our ass more than once. Thank you.

Kevin (Whizard72) said...

Ken, Been following the Helios Project / Reglue for many years. I am not rich, I live on part time work and take care of my austistic son's needs. I truly do wish I could be so blessed with a financial windfall to live debt free and make other peoples' lives better. I wish our country would stop spending countless billions on Aircraft Carriers and Planes that don't work and more on infrastructure and people.