Julie Ostrovsky
Charity Spotlight: Autism Community Trust From Founders Julie Ostrovsky & Richard Femenella
T
he Autism Community Trust is a non-profit organization that’s meant to help support people with autism in the Las Vegas community. See below insight into the organization from Julie Ostrovsky and Richard Femenella. “[The Autism Community Trust is] a very special non-profit that raises money to support programs in the community that support people with autism. We most recently opened a location for people with disabilities to socialize and hang out.” Ostrovsky and Femenella had a specific visionwhen they created this non-profit organization. They wanted to not only support already existing programs in the community, but to also offer safe spaces for young people with autism to interact. “We wanted to support outstanding programs in the community and offer a social opportunity for young adults that don’t have many options in the community.” The needs of people with autism in the Las Vegas community, are high with resources and services hard to find. The Autism Community Trust tries to fulfill every need they can for the families they serve across the Las Vegas Valley. “There are year long waiting lists for diagnosis because of the limited number of doctors certified to provide such an evaluation and can be up to another year to get services. Medicaid rates are some of the lowest in the country and insurance can be limiting. So finding services and funds for services is challenging.” The Autism Community Trust also funds a Games and iPad program with FEAT of
Living LArge LV
Julie Ostrovsky & Richard Femenella from the Autism Community Trust.
Southern Nevada - Families for Effective Autism Treatment, another non-profit. One of Ostrovsky and Femenella’s biggest inspirations about their work that they do with the Autism Community Trust is the response that they get back from the families and participants that they serve and are part of their organization. While the Autism Community Trust is one of many non-profit organizations in the Las Vegas Valley, they set themselves apart from other organizations when looking at how much of their proceeds that they actually donate to their participants. “One-hundred percent of the money raised goes directly to the people who participate in the Autism Community Trust (ACT) programs and programs that ACT supports. The organization is run by volunteers who do not take a salary or any
money for programming or funding. That is unique in our community.” Alongside ACT giving their full proceeds to the families they serve, they also run mostly by volunteers that aren’t paid and just want to help and give back which is also unique. If interested in making a donation to the Autism Community Trust please visit this site: gofundme.com/f/jigsaw-jam-viii. LV
