LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. — Creative Hope Studios and substance abuse treatment center, Manos House, are joining forces to give a little extra this Friday.
"To actually raise money to build recording studio programs, train the staff, and empower them with the culture and the information to run the program
and run it for kids and do it for facilities that are underfunded," TJ Griffin, co-founder of Creative Hope Studios, said.
The Lancaster County Community Foundation is hosting its 10th annual Extraordinary Give raising money for charities to help make a difference.
Creative Hope Studios has built several recording studios across the nation to help at-risk youth in juvenile detention centers and treatment programs find expression but also, hope.
"A lot of the youth that we deal with, hold in so much anger and so much expression that they can't release due to the environments they've grown up in," Jose Rios, co-founder of Creative Hope Studios, said.
Griffin says there continues to be a negative outlook on young adolescents who make a wrong turn and adds while there must be proper accountability, we must remember what brings many children to a certain point.
"The environments are broken, there's violence in the community, there's drugs everywhere," Griffin said. "There's broken family households and then these kids are kind of left alone a lot of times."
This kind of pain is no stranger to the founders as they have faced their own levels of grief in their upbringing; they thank the genre of hip-hop.
"It's changed my thought process," Rios said. "It's created a home and a great environment and future for myself and my kids. It also allows me to give my talent as a way to help other kids and help other youth and have them believe in themselves."
Manos House provides aid to male teens ages 14 to 19. Administrators told FOX43, the level of negativity and amount of trial they've received at a young age can be unbearable and difficult to speak of.
"Along the way, unfortunately, someone has said 'You're going to be just like your brother,' 'You're going to be just like your mother,' 'You're going to be just like your father that's incarcerated, and that OD'd and died,'" Cassie Coder, clinical director at Manos House, said.
Coder says to continue having therapeutic and fun activities for the kids such as recording studios, funds are needed and resources are a must.
Griffin says if anyone would like to donate, they can head to the Lancaster County Community Foundation's Extraordinary Give website, and the Manos House website.