Tinley Park Holiday Toy Drives Benefitting Children with Cancer

Area residents and businesses have an opportunity to support children and teens fighting cancer by donating a new toy or gift during the Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation (P.O.T.C.F.) annual holiday toy drive.

The POTCF is a non-profit organization that provides comfort and distraction from painful procedures to children and teens diagnosed with cancer by providing a toy, gift or gift certificate in 50 hospitals nationwide. Nowhere else in the nation does such a program exist. CEO Colleen Kisel founded the organization in 1996 after her then seven-year-old son Martin had been diagnosed with leukemia in 1993. Ms. Kisel discovered that giving her son a toy after each procedure provided a calming distraction from his pain, noting that when children are diagnosed with cancer their world soon becomes filled with doctors, nurses, chemotherapy drugs, surgeries and seemingly endless painful procedures. Martin recently celebrated his 23rd anniversary of remission from the disease.

Unwrapped, brand new toys or gifts may be dropped off December 2nd through December 23rd at these locations:

•Christa McAuliffe School, 8944 W 174th Street, Tinley Park

•Country Financial, 7601 W. 191st Street, Suite 2-upper level, Tinley Park

•Dunkin Donuts, 7935 W. 171st Avenue, Tinley Park

•G-W Publisher, 18604 W. Creek Drive, Tinley Park

•Helen Keller School, 7846 W. 163rd Street, Tinley Park

•John A. Bannes School, 16835 S. Odell Avenue, Tinley Park

•KVH Industries, 8412 185th Street, Tinley Park

•Millennium Elementary School, 17830 S. 84th Avenue, Tinley Park

•Porter Place, 7529 W. 183rd Street, Tinley Park

• Prairie View Middle School, 8500 175th Street, Tinley Park

•PTSIR, 17236 S. Harlem Avenue, Tinley Park

•SALT, Seniors and Law Enforcement Together, 7850 W. 183rd St., Tinley Park

•Tinley Park Chamber of Commerce, 17316 S. Oak Park Avenue, Tinley Park

•Toast Masters, 16130 Oak Park Avenue, Tinley Park

•Virgil I. Grissom Middle School, 17000 S. 80th Avenue, Tinley Park

If you would like further information about the Treasure Chest Foundation, please contact Colleen Kisel at 708-687-TOYS (8697) or visit the Foundation’s web site at: www.treasurechest.org