Able ARTS Work is throwing an ice cream social at its Bixby Knolls headquarters on August 29, marking 44 years of serving people with developmental disabilities and autism across Southern California while raising money to pay off the very building where the party will happen. The event runs from 1 to 4 p.m. at 3841 Atlantic Ave. and folds in live music, art activities and a silent auction, with general admission tickets priced at $25.
The fundraiser doubles as a birthday party and a building-fund pitch, according to the Press Telegram. Proceeds go toward the organization’s ongoing “A Home of Our Own” capital campaign, which needs to raise $250,000 a year to retire the loan on its Atlantic Avenue headquarters. Once the building is paid off, that money can instead flow directly into programs and services, the paper reports.
Kristy Glass, Able ARTS Work’s senior director of community advancement, told the Press Telegram that the ice cream social format is a callback to the organization’s earliest days, saying it was popular when the nonprofit first opened. The celebration will include an ice cream truck, keyboard performances from student musicians, a band playing acoustic classic rock hits, a zine library and limited-edition merchandise, per the same report.
From a Rented Storefront to a Building of Its Own
Able ARTS Work traces its roots to 1982, when board-certified music therapist Helen Dolas founded the organization in Long Beach under the name Arts & Services for Disabled, Inc. while completing her master’s degree in special education. Dolas, now the organization’s founder and CEO, has also served since 1984 as Clinical Training Director of an American Music Therapy Association-approved internship program and sits on the music therapy faculty at California State University, Northridge…