A $7 Million Twist to Last Week's Story

Local News

If you're still figuring out how to fill the weeks ahead, there's no shortage of options between Dublin City Schools and the rec center.

On the schools side, the variety is genuinely impressive — dozens of programs spanning sports, arts, STEM, coding, music, and academic enrichment. Something for pretty much every age and interest, whether your kid wants to learn to row, build robots, train for competition, or just stay sharp over the break. Browse that lineup at dublinschools.net.

The rec center has its own summer camp lineup too, and some of it is downright fun. There's a Fortnite camp where kids design their own maps using the same engine behind the actual game, a pickleball camp for the fastest-growing sport around, archery at Darree Fields, and a slime-themed STEAM camp that's exactly as messy as it sounds. Spots are filling up — some are already almost full — so if something catches your eye, don't wait too long. Browse the full rec center lineup here.

Local News

If you sit on a nonprofit board, volunteer for a local cause, or donate regularly around Dublin, you already know how hard fundraising has gotten lately. Colleen does too — and helping organizations through exactly that is what she does for a living.

Colleen is a Dublin mom of four and the founder of Cause & Effect Solutions, a fundraising strategy firm that works alongside nonprofits when they're stretched thin, losing momentum, or just not sure where to focus. Not as someone who parachutes in with a generic plan, but as a steady partner who's spent her career on both sides of the table — leading development work inside organizations during a staffing transition or consulting from the outside.

The model is worth understanding. A lot of nonprofits need experienced fundraising leadership but can't justify a full-time hire. Colleen steps in at that gap — bringing the strategy, structure, and clarity that keeps fundraising moving without adding to an already overloaded team.

It's a tough time to be raising money. The needs haven't gotten smaller. If you're connected to a nonprofit that's been running on fumes, worth passing her name along.

Learn more here.

Local News

Some follow-up on the story we shared last week about our neighbor — the 83-year-old Dublin woman who'd spent years planning every detail of her funeral, only for her family to learn she'd been cremated against those wishes.

The Hilliard funeral home responded this week with an apology. "We failed you, and no words can change that," the statement read. They said it's the only mistake of its kind in more than 4,300 cremations as a family business. They refunded what the family paid, and covered the cost out of their own pocket for another funeral home to carry out her wishes and place her alongside her husband. They also self-reported it to the state licensing board and let the employee go.

The family's attorney is now seeking $7 million in a settlement. The owner says a number that size would put him — and the 30 people who work for him — out of business.

This is still working its way through Franklin County court. Our thoughts remain with the family.

You can read the funeral home's full statement here.