The Omni Hotel in Dallas opened their doors to five hundred homeless people on Christmas eve as a way of giving back to the community.
“They come in with the smiles on their faces, from ear to ear,” Ed Netzhammer, a manager at Omni told NBC.
“You can’t stop doing it once you see it,” he added.
Netzhammer started this charity effort in 2011, just one month after the hotel opened. Netzhammer and the Omni work together with a local organization called The SoupMobile which helps to provide food for their stay.
Netzhammer doesn’t stop there either, this year he has decided to give one homeless family a place to live.
“We are going to adopt a family. We call it A Home for the Holidays. We’re gonna find 2500 people who can give $12. We have housing, food from Kroger, and you guys with NBC as a partner and, we’re sort of saying Texas connects us with our thousand people and we want to connect with another 1,500 more and take a family off the streets. I gotta tell you, 12-year-old kids are on video games a lot these days and for my son to put down his games and have an interest in something that was so important to me was pretty special,” Netzhammer said.
“I talked about peaceful nights that they would have at our hotel. and when I talked about hope, I said my hope is that none of you will be back in the same shape next year,” he added.
Omni workers have also contributed to the cause from their own paychecks.
“I think it’s great, I really do. because I’ve been in situations in my life where I didn’t know where I was going to eat or sleep sometimes,” Omni employee Ted Boyd said.
Another employee, Leslie Dunn, said that it was great “to be part of something bigger than yourself. I donated $12 to a family, I need to help support them and help them get back on their feet. That $12 is gonna go to help them have a new home as well as groceries for a year.”
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John Vibes is an author and researcher who organizes a number of large events including the Free Your Mind Conference. He also has a publishing company where he offers a censorship free platform for both fiction and non-fiction writers. You can contact him and stay connected to his work at his Facebook page. You can purchase his books, or get your own book published at his website www.JohnVibes.com.
