Runaas Resources Public Relations

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Local Celebrity Hosts First Houston Concert to Benefit Victims of Sexual Assault

All net proceeds from the concert to support the nation’s largest anti-sexual assault organization

Spring, TX – July 29, 2008 – Jennifer Grassman, local celebrity and recording artist, will host the city’s first RAINN Over Houston Benefit Concert, to help support the efforts of the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN).  The fundraising concert will take place at the Meridian in Houston in June of 2009.

“It is a tragedy that has tainted the lives of many of us,” says Grassman. “I myself am an abuse survivor.  My best friend is a rape survivor.  We are not alone.”  Every two minutes someone in the United States is sexually assaulted and 60% of those cases go unreported to the police, according to RAINN, the country’s largest anti-sexual assault organization. 

Grassman, a resident of Spring, is hosting the event to raise awareness and educate the public on how to reduce the risks of assault for themselves and their loved ones.  She will perform during the concert, which will feature speakers and other notable Houston personalities, such as Ernie Manouse, show host of PBS’ Inner Views. 

The financial goal of the event is to raise at least $30,000 with 100% of net proceeds to be donated to RAINN.  Grassman is also dedicating her third album to the organization and contributing a portion of the sale proceeds to their cause.

Tickets will go on sale early next year.  Several sponsorship packages are available for local benefactors to consider.  For more information on the concert or sponsorship opportunities, please contact Jennifer Grassman Music at jennifergrassmanmusic@comcast.net or 281-573-0610. 

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Jennifer Grassman is a singer, composer and recording artist.  Her songs are inspired by her desire to console and reassure listeners who are suffering and to inspire meaningful thought and great expectations. She is currently on tour in Texas.  To learn more, please visit www.myspace.com/JenniferGrassman or www.myspace.com/rainnoverhouston.

The Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN) created and operates the National Sexual Assault Hotline (800-656-HOPE) which has helped over 1.2 million people since its inception in 1994.  RAINN recently launched the National Sexual Assault Online Hotline (www.rainn.org), the country’s first secure web-based hotline, which provides a safe, secure and anonymous place for victims to get help online.  RAINN also helps to educate over 130 million college students each year about sexual assault, and leads national efforts to improve services to victims and ensure that rapists are brought to justice. 

Houston Artist Creates Anti-Smoking Coloring Book for Children

Houston, TX – January 7, 2008 – Freelance artist and poet, Tim Webb, a Spring resident, also known as Texas Tim, announced today that he has created an anti-smoking coloring book to reach young children with the message that cigarette smoking is harmful to their health through cartoon illustrations and poems.

Webb’s goal is to provide a means for parents to teach their children in the tender years to refrain from cigarette smoking or, as he puts it, “to dodge the smoking bullet.”

According to the American Cancer Society (ACS), “cigarettes kill more Americans than alcohol, car accidents, suicide, AIDS, homicide, and illegal drugs combined.” The ACS strongly recommends that ‘parents start talking about tobacco use when their children are 5 or 6 years old and to continue through their high school years’ as a preventative measure.

One helpful tool that parents can use to introduce anti-smoking messages to their Pre-K and early elementary school age children is the new coloring book, “Smoke in Your Eye Makes You Cry,” written and illustrated by Texas Tim, which includes imaginative jokes, puns and play on word poetry with original caricature art that is sure to attract young children while teaching them that smoking cigarettes is a poor choice.

Using the term Sickerettes (c) to describe cigarettes, the coloring book features characters such as “Ollie Owl” who can fly for miles because smoking is not his style or “Freddy Frog” who tells his young audience that there is “no room for an ash tray on my lily pad.” The sensible frog adds, “A fisherman offered me a Sickerette (c) / Certainly as a joke/ What, me use tobacco/ You think I want to croak?”

Experts agree that parents are the primary factor in a child’s choice to abstain from smoking. Dr. Denton A. Cooley, M.D., founder, president and surgeon-in-chief of the Texas Heart Institute, prescribes in the foreword that “this book belongs in every child’s ‘Survival Kit.’ The knowledge will serve them from childhood through adulthood into their parenthood.”

“Texas Tim” Webb, (http://www.texastim.com/), freelance artist and poet, wants to work with schools, health organizations and interested private parties and businesses to spread the anti-smoking message in a delightful, easy to understand way to children. The coloring books are available for purchase for only $5.00 each at http://www.texastim.com/.

Contact:
Candace Runaas
Runaas Resources PR
281.257.4431