White Plains, NY - August 21, 2000 |  Through a campaign run by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Police Department and contributors from the entire Hudson Valley, hundreds of women who are the victims of domestic violence will receive free cellular phones with emergency 911 functions.

The Family Shelter of Rockland County left a recent presentation ceremony in Yonkers with phones to distribute to area women. They were jointly presented by the MTA Police, who collected the phones; Response Insurance, who donated a portion of the phones; and Hudson Valley Cellular, who re-programmed them for emergency service.

At the ceremony, Assistant Deputy Chief of the MTA Police, William Mele, said more than 1,800 phones had been collected at MTA facilities from area residents and corporations, but more are needed. Ray Palermo, representing Response Insurance, a national auto insurance company headquartered in Westchester, noted that one-fifth of Response Insurance’s employees donated cell phones to the program. He went on to implore other area businesses to organize their own employee cell phone collection drives stating that "good neighbors can’t afford to turn a deaf-ear to a problem like domestic violence."

The domestic violence organizations in the Hudson Valley who received donations included Orange County Safe Homes, Dutchess County’s Grace Smith House and the YWCA of Dutchess County, Rockland County Family Shelter, Sullivan County Safe Passage, Ulster County Family Domestic Violence Program, My Sister’s Place in Westchester and the Northern Westchester/Putnam Womens Resource Center.

PHOTO (left to right): Officer Kevin McGinley, MTAPD; Amy Paul, My Sister’s Place; Mary Bridget Klinkenbergh, Northern Westchester/Putnam Womens Resource Center; Officer Joseph Kelly, MTAPD; Elizabeth Pak, Grace Smith House; Pamela Kravetz, YWCA of Dutchess County Battered Women Services; Ray Palermo, Response Insurance; Assistant Deputy Chief William Mele; Chief of Police James O’Donnell; Susan Rose, Orange County Safe Home; Alisa Robbins, Grace Smith House; Officer Theresa McGrory, MTAPD; Captain Stephen McCabe, MTAPD; Steve Brown, Hudson Valley Cellular; and Captain Kevin McConville, MTAPD.