Our Programs

My Brother’s Keeper can respond with everything needed to furnish a bare apartment: beds, cribs, dressers, refrigerators, kitchen sets, and living room sets as well as important household items like dishes, pots, pans, sheets, and towels. We obtain these items through a combination of residential and commercial donations and we supplement with purchases as needed.

My Brother’s Keeper is one of the only charities in Southeastern Massachusetts delivering furniture assistance free of charge as a core program. This is vitally important to those without transportation or the physical means to move heavy items.

Our staff and volunteers complete approximately 1,800 furniture deliveries each year to households in 50 cities and towns on the South Shore and South Coast

In response to COVID-19, My Brother’s Keeper has expanded its Food Assistance Program. Each week, an average of 350 food deliveries are being made in Brockton, Easton, Fall River, New Bedford, Dartmouth, and Westport.

We are the only local charity that delivers food assistance and emergency groceries as a core program, very important to the elderly and those without transportation.

Individuals and families in need call My Brother’s Keeper between 10AM–12PM and receive a substantial, healthy food delivery between 3–5 pm the same day.

Our deliveries consist of non-perishable canned goods, a wonderful variety of fresh fruits and vegetables plus milk, juice, eggs, butter, meat, cheese, and bread. The average retail value of each food delivery is $200 but our cost per food delivery is only $12 thanks to significant in-kind donations. No cost is ever passed along to those we serve.

Since 1990, My Brother’s Keeper has brought joy to kids and removed stress from parents who could not provide presents for their children at Christmas.

This past December, My Brother’s Keeper delivered personally-selected gifts to 3,150 families – more than 13,000 children and adults! – living in 95 communities from the North Shore down to Fall River and Cape Cod.

Many Christmas assistance programs only serve children under age 13, but in keeping with our mission, My Brother’s Keeper serves the whole family – children, teens, and parents too.

In addition to their presents, each family also receives a $50 supermarket gift card to help provide a special Christmas meal.
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Loaves and Fishes

In 2003, My Brother’s Keeper launched Credentials for Credibility, a program which helps homeless adults obtain a driver’s license by offering access to free driver’s education.

The program was inspired by our conversations while making deliveries. On numerous occasions, we met unlicensed middle-aged adults who felt a great stigma and sense of inferiority because they lacked a basic skill which most teenagers possess.

Of equal importance, adults who lack a driver’s license also face a tremendous disadvantage in the work place. A 2005 study conducted at the University of Wisconsin concluded “possession of a driver’s license and car is a stronger predictor of leaving public assistance than even a high school diploma.”

For Credentials for Credibility, My Brother’s Keeper partners with area homeless shelters and driving schools whose accredited instructors go to the shelter to pick up students for driving lessons. When students are deemed ready, instructors accompany them to the Registry of Motor Vehicles and use school vehicles for the driving test.

My Brother’s Keeper provides strict program oversight and pays all associated costs: driving lessons, test registration fees, and the actual cost of licenses.

Since the program’s inception, 80% of our participants have successfully obtained their driver’s license.