Lynn businesses team up to help Haiti

LYNN – Toomey’s Cleaners says they “take pride in the way you look” and in true good-neighbor form, they teamed up with General Electric to contribute to the Haiti relief effort.One GE employee noticed a surplus of nearly 750 T-shirts left over from company events and thought they could be put to better use in Haiti, where people are in great need of a vast number of supplies.”We approached Toomey’s cleaners and asked the owner if he would be willing to donate his time and service to clean them up and make sure they are in a decent fashion so we could bundle them up and send them off,” said GE’s Richard Gorham. “Once we get them back we will ship them over to the appropriate agencies.”Robert Kaminski, owner of Toomey’s Cleaners, was happy to oblige.”They thought (the shirts) were too soiled, so we cleaned them up. We washed them, we folded them, we repackaged them for (GE), boxed them up and hopefully they’re on their way. We are glad to help anybody out. They are local, we are local and if it does anybody else some good, why not?” Kaminski said.”It’s such a tragedy what happened over there and a bunch of folks, individuals and companies are stepping up in terms of donations,” Gorham said. “We just wanted to surface the willingness of Toomey’s to step up and collaborate with us and thank the owner and the employees for their willingness to help a cause and the people in need.”Kaminski said it wasn’t a problem to donate the time and work.”(We’re) just being a good neighbor, that’s all,” he said.In addition to the T-shirts, GE employees and retirees have made significant financial contributions, which the company had promised to match. Together, they have been able to commit $4.5 million to be issued in interim payments to the American Red Cross and the U.S. Fund for UNICEF.