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 54 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 celebrated his 25th anniversary of remission from the disease earlier this year.

Unwrapped, brand new toys or gifts may be dropped off December 4th through December 21st at these locations

•Arrenello’s Pizza, 9420 W. 179th Street

•Bickford Assisted Living and Memory Care, 17301 80th Avenue

•Brookside Glen, 19416 Lisadell Drive

•Byline Bank, 16700 S. Oak Park Avenue

•Christa McAuliffe School, 8944 W 174th Street

•Dunkin Donuts, 7935 W. 171st Avenue

•First Midwest Bank, 16700 S. 80th Avenue

•First Midwest Bank, 17500 S. Oak Park Avenue

•Helen Keller School, 7846 W. 163rd Street

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

•KVH Industries, 8412 185th Street

•Millennium Elementary School, 17830 S. 84th Avenue

•My Care Dental, 18311 S. North Creek Drive

•Numark Credit Union, 8001 W. 159th Street

• Prairie View Middle School, 8500 175th Street

•PTSIR, 17236 S. Harlem Avenue

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

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

•Tinley Park Park District, 8125 W. 171st Street

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

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