With about 350 guests in attendance, the event kicked off with MC Pat Monacelli, President & CEO of the Broomfield Area Chamber, sharing the program theme of, “Won’t you be my neighbor?” The Broomfield Area Chamber is FISH’s neighbor, just across the parking lot, and Pat shared several examples of how FISH staff have helped him in a neighborly way. Pat thanked the lengthy list of sponsors, noting that it was a true honor to do so, as his 24+ years spent working with Non Profits lends to his understanding of how much event sponsorship means to an organization putting on a fundraiser such as Embracing Hope. Pat thanked the elected officials in attendance, including Broomfield Mayor Guyleen Castriotta, most of the Broomfield City Council, and more. Pat also thanked the volunteers who helped with the event, as well as FISH staff and the Delta Hotel event staff.

The welcome section was capped off by Pat introducing FISH’s Executive Director, Dayna Scott, who shared how neighbors have helped her in times of great need. Dayna also shared that last year, Broomfield FISH served 1 out of every 5 Broomfield residents. She stated that, from pre–pandemic times (2019) to 2024, the number of people FISH served has DOUBLED. On top of that, last year FISH saw a 12% increase in the number of people served, and FISH gave out more food than ever before in history–  a whopping 1.7 million pounds in 2025! Dayna engaged the guests with an activity where they were asked to pass around their table’s water pitcher and guess the weight. It turned out, the weight of the pitcher didn’t matter, what mattered was how long they could hold the weight for. The activity demonstrated that when times are tough, life can be made a little easier if we all just “pitch-er in” and help out our neighbors by holding the weight together.

Dayna turned the microphone back over to Pat, who introduced the next speakers, FISH volunteers Ella Powell and Lucia Fang, who delivered a speech together. Both women began volunteering at FISH as small children, and the audience laughed upon hearing their initial motivations– Dum Dum lollipops and bragging rights for finding the oldest donated item. Both Ella and Lucia were members of the Youth Engagement Board, which is now called the Youth Engagement Squad (Y.E.S.). Then COVID hit, and everything changed for them. Ella and Lucia both found new motivations for diving deeper into volunteerism, and shared their deeply meaningful takeaways from their continued volunteerism with FISH. Ella teared up at the memory of giving a little boy a box of apples, and Lucia used the example to share the economics behind a financial donation to FISH.

You can read Ella and Lucia’s full speech below.

As their powerful speech wrapped up, Ella introduced the participant speaker, Betty Avera, who greeted Ella and Lucia with warm hugs and smiles. This speech was the event’s emotional peak. Betty is a Broomfield FISH participant who truly exemplifies the organization’s full-circle mission to provide people with hope and tools to rise out of poverty. Due to a surprising turn of events, Betty first found herself unhoused and living on the street for the first time at 78 years old, alongside her son, his fiance, and two dogs. Betty spoke about how someone from The Refuge’s outreach program found them, and introduced Betty’s family to their neighbor, Broomfield FISH. The audience was empathetic when Betty admitted she couldn’t read her speech due to all the tears. If you’re interested in learning more about Betty’s story…

You can read Betty’s full speech below.

Betty stepped off stage amidst a standing ovation, after which Pat recapped the speakers’ messages, and introduced the primere of Broomfield FISH’s new Mission Video. This year’s mission video featured a wide variety of people, including members of the Youth Engagement Squad, community organizers, faith leaders, participants, and staff, who all echoed what it means to be a neighbor, and how FISH embodies the qualities of what it means to be a good neighbor.

As the mission video wrapped up, Pat took the stage to reiterate the data behind the need, and echoed the idea that Broomfield FISH steps up as a neighbor to everyone regardless of need. 

Pat closed the event with a call to action to show up as FISH’s neighbor, and support with a donation. His last words to guests were, “Let’s meet this need together and prove once more that in Broomfield, no one stands alone. Thank you for being the best neighbors anyone could ask for.”

Hello Everyone,

My name is Betty Avera, and I am so glad to be here today as one of your neighbors. You know, one day I was just talking to Dayna about my story, and the next thing you know, I’m up on this stage! That’s how it is with FISH. They see something that needs doing, and they just do it. It’s part of that “FISH Magic,” as they say.

I’m here today because I want to tell you how Broomfield FISH helped me and my son. And I’ll tell you this now—my life didn’t turn out exactly how I’d envisioned it, but I am here, I am stable, and my son is thriving. He couldn’t be here today because he’s in Nebraska, working on his engineering degree. That’s a sentence I could only have dreamed of just a few years ago, when we were living on the street together.

Before all that happened, I had a pretty good life. Nothing fancy, but we weren’t living paycheck to paycheck. But then, my husband’s dementia took a turn, and I couldn’t care for him at home anymore. Finding another place for him was the right decision, but it was heartbreaking, and suddenly, I was all alone. I came up to Colorado to visit my son. I LOVED it here. We drove around all over, visited the mountains, saw all the sights, and I ended up deciding to move in with my son. The same day I moved in and helped him pay the rent, they served him with an eviction notice. We were completely blindsided.

And just like that, at 78 years old, I was without a home for the first time in my life. 

For the next three and a half years, I lived on the streets with my son, his fiancé, and my two dogs. It was hard, but we were together. And in Broomfield, we quickly learned something important: Even if you are without a home, you are never without a neighbor.

One day, someone from The Refuge’s outreach program found us. Has anyone heard of The Refuge? For us, it was a lifeline. They helped us with food, clothes, blankets—I still remember a beautiful red duffel bag someone gave me. Soon after that, The Refuge told us about their neighbor, Broomfield FISH.

Now, I hadn’t been to a food pantry before, so I didn’t know what to expect. And remember, this was during the pandemic. We drove up in our car, and the most wonderful people put boxes of healthy food right into our trunk—milk, fresh fruits, vegetables… things we desperately needed.

After FISH reopened their indoor marketplace, I was shopping there one day, and I asked a volunteer if they had any SPAM, because it’s a shelf stable food that would last a long time in a car, without a refrigerator. There weren’t any cans of SPAM on the shelves. The volunteer said, “Hold on one second,” and found me a couple cans of SPAM from the back. That’s just one example of how the volunteers at FISH care so much, and they have always been just so good to me.

That’s what I saw then, and it’s what I see today in this room: a team whose mission is simply to get things done for their neighbors who need it.

That simple gift of food gave us the stability we needed to focus on getting back on our feet. The friendly faces from volunteers like Ella and Lucia gave us hope. The food and the love combined… It gave us the energy to keep going. So much of that came from you– my neighbors in this very room, even though we hadn’t met yet. Well, we’re meeting now, and I’m here today to tell you… we got the cereal from your child’s food drive. We used the cooking oil you brought in for the shelf you adopted. We ate the apples your donation purchased.

Today, things look very different. I am proud to stand here and tell you I am in stable housing, I can pay my bills, and my son is on his way to becoming an engineer.

And another thing has changed… I buy my groceries at the store now. But there would be no shame if I still needed FISH. The second I do, I’ll walk right through those doors again, knowing I’ll be met with dignity and respect, never judgment. There are so many seniors like myself who live on fixed incomes that will need to rely on FISH for a long time, as we don’t have a lot of opportunities for our financial situations to change, like my son does. That’s okay too. That’s why I give back now. I put something in the FISH donation bin at King Soopers every chance I get, because I know exactly what it feels like to be the person receiving that item. Now I get to be the neighbor for someone I’ve never met.

I am no longer in the dire situation I once was, so I ask this on behalf of all the other families, the seniors on fixed incomes, and the other mothers out there who need our help:

FISH was there for me. Will you be there for them? 

Please donate whatever you can today. In the immortal words of Mr. Rogers… Won’t you be my neighbor? 

Ella: Hello everyone, I’m Ella Powell.

Lucia: And I’m Lucia Fang. We are so honored to share our stories with you today. For both of us, Broomfield FISH isn’t just a place to volunteer—it’s been a part of our lives and our hearts for over a decade.

Ella: It all started out for me in a very simple way. My family began volunteering at Broomfield FISH right after we moved to Colorado 13 years ago. I was nine, and if I’m being honest, I was mostly motivated by the Dum Dum lollipops we got after working a shift and the bragging rights from finding the oldest can on the shelf—as far as I know, the current record is a can of tuna from 1990! What began as a fun family activity slowly grew into something much more meaningful. I joined the Youth Advisory Board, which is now called the Youth Engagement Squad (or YES!), and I learned how to advocate for our neighbors. Over the years, volunteering became less about what I was doing, and more about who I was becoming. FISH taught me the power of showing up, and that’s a lesson that has shaped my life.

Lucia: My story also started when I was little. In third grade, tagging along with friends. All I really remember from back then is checking cans for dents and thinking the old building was so small. But that memory stuck. When I came back in high school, what I found was more cans and a bigger space BUT this time, I became a part of a mission. Like Ella, I joined the Youth Advisory Board. Everything was great and I even got to lead as Co-president, but my senior year of high school, COVID hit. It was a dark and uncertain time for everyone. The world felt like it had stopped, but FISH kept going…and going…and going, so many people needed food. People needed our help more than ever and I felt this deep pull to show up and do something. I spent over 200 hours volunteering that year because Broomfield FISH was proof that even when things feel like they’re falling apart, we will always be there to care for each other because that’s what community is all about. Broomfield FISH wasn’t just there for our neighbors who needed help with food and housing, they were there for me too. They gave me hope during a very dark time.

Ella: FISH was also there for me. Before COVID, my work was mostly behind the scenes. But during those difficult months, I started volunteering at FISH’s outdoor food distribution line, meeting families face-to-face. I’ll never forget one young boy who lit up when he saw that apples were included in their box that week. It wasn’t just about the food; it was about dignity, care, and knowing someone was there for you. It made me realize this is where I find my purpose: connecting with people in meaningful, compassionate ways and reminding them they’re not alone. And in doing so, I realized I wasn’t alone either. Helping others works both ways.

Lucia: Between the two of us, we’ve spent thousands of hours running food drives, sorting through cans, and leading volunteer groups. I can truly say we love it! There’s something so powerful about seeing our community come together to fill shelves with much-needed donations of food. But today, we want to talk about something different. An incredibly powerful way to give. Let’s imagine you want to help a neighbor by donating a bag of apples–like the ones Ella remembers giving to the little boy. If you went to the store right now to buy a bag of apples to donate to FISH, it would cost you about five dollars to make that purchase. You’d take the five dollar bag of apples to FISH and check in the food donation with someone like Mike. Who here knows FISH’s Food Operations Manager, Mike Lutz? Mike, can you wave? Sure… Mike could help you check in the bag of apples, AND he’d probably tell you a dad joke while doing it, but another part of Mike’s job is to take the money donated to FISH and buy things like…bags of apples. Because FISH is a nonprofit and Mike has bulk buying power, (pause), he can purchase that same five dollar bag of apples for less than two dollars.  Your dollar, when given directly to FISH, suddenly has MORE THAN DOUBLE the buying power than you do at the grocery store. Your donation becomes a tool that allows Broomfield FISH to stretch every bit of generosity to meet the specific needs of our community, day in and day out. It’s not just about getting more food—it’s about creating more impact.

Ella: And the scale of that impact is amazing. In 2025, FISH will have distributed more than 1.7 million pounds of food.  To help picture what that really means, that’s enough to fill 13 THOUSAND grocery carts. Now, imagine if we started lining all of those carts up, right outside this ballroom, that line of carts would continue for over 8 miles…… stopping almost exactly at the doorstep of Broomfield FISH. Food drives are an essential part of that. They bring our community together, and we absolutely need them. But today, we’re focusing on financial gifts because they allow FISH to be strategic and responsive. The dedicated staff and volunteers know exactly what our neighbors are asking for each week, and believe me, it’s probably not an expired can of tuna. Your financial donation ensures FISH can purchase exactly that—whether it’s leafy greens in the winter or fresh apples year round—instead of having to sort through items that might not be what a family wants or needs, it allows FISH to provide not just food, but the right food, with dignity and care, every single time.

 Lucia: Volunteering at FISH has taught us that every action, big or small, matters. And that’s what we want to leave you with today. Whether you donate time, food, or money, it’s about more than that. It’s about showing up in whatever way you can. It’s about knowing our neighbors matter and showing them you care, even if you’ve never met them before. Today, your generosity does exactly that. It doesn’t just keep the shelves stocked or the lights on; it keeps hope alive. It keeps Broomfield connected and sends a powerful message to every single person who walks through FISH’s doors. Their community believes in them, no matter what they’re facing. Thank you for listening to our stories, for believing in your neighbors, and for helping us build a stronger, kinder, more connected Broomfield. Thank you.