People with Purpose: Kristy Cail

Kristy Cail’s involvement with charitable organizations in Sarasota began about nine years ago. Since then, she’s served on committees, chaired eight fundraising events and done everything in between. But, for Cail, her favorite type of work is behind the scenes and the work in which she can involve her children.

My start was with the Boys and Girls Clubs. When Tom and I were dating, he was heavily involved with the organization. I also started getting involved with Children First about five years ago. I was introduced to the organization after attending its Flip Flops and Fashion luncheon. The program absolutely moved me. Hearing Philip Tavil speak was what made me say, “I need to take a tour.” I knew it was for me. I’ve narrowed down the organizations I’m involved with to predominately children’s organizations. I feel I can do my most work with the charities for children because that strikes home for me.

I stumbled across Family Promise a year and half ago and started doing meals for the families, who are homeless and move from different churches every couple of weeks to help them get back on their feet. They have children, often several, and they need good meals cooked and prepared for them. It’s especially moving for me because I can get my son involved. He helps me prepare the meals and we have sat and had dinner with the families. He can’t quite comprehend everything, but he understands why we are doing this — because we are helping another family. He can see that it is just what we do. We help people.

I love all things creative and I like to make things by myself. The challenge I love the most with events is “how do we do this for nothing?” Everything I do for events — for décor and auction baskets — comes out of my home. It drives my husband nuts — he’ll come home and I have the auction on my kitchen table and the décor and centerpieces everywhere else. My focus always is, “How can this look great and how can we do this cheaper?”

Most recently, I’ve gotten involved with the Visible Men Academy, which is an absolutely amazing program. It’s a school in Bradenton providing boys from low-income communities with a high-quality educational experience in a nurturing environment. The school is not just educational, but it teaches manners and love and helps instill a sense of control for the students’ futures. I found out about the school through one of the founding members, Cindy Day.

There is no better purpose than investing in our children. Every child deserves to have a chance, the same chance that the rest of our children have. When I see people like Cindy and Visible Men Academy and Children First and Boys and Girls Clubs spending every waking moment to help these children, it’s moving to see that they believe in them. I think that is all that kids need — people to believe in them. The confidence building and love that is shown to these children is so important because a lot of them don’t get that at home.

In the beginning, being involved filled a void — it’s hard leaving a job after having children and feeling like you’re still contributing to the community in some way. Now, as a mom, it’s so important to get my children involved. My hope is that if they see me, they will be involved as well, and it teaches them empathy. Empathy is something that so many children lack, especially in such an affluent community like the one we live in. I don’t think our children realize that not everyone lives like that. They don’t understand or aren’t even aware of the real struggles that families face. That is the most important thing, for my children to see the reality of how the world really is.