This is a line from Katharine McPhee’s song “Lifetime,” and it keeps going through my head after meeting Shanta Barton-Stubbs, who founded and runs New Image Youth Center in Orlando, Fla.

New Image is a summer feeding location supported by the Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida, which received a Hunger-Free Summer grant to support summer food locations in Orlando.

But, if you’re like me, when you think of Orlando, you immediately think of Walt Disney World, the happiest place on earth. But near downtown Orlando on Parramore Street, life is very different; the children in this neighborhood are much more likely to face poverty, violence and drug abuse. 

Shanta is turning a moment into a lifetime of hope.
Now 28, Shanta opened the New Image Youth Center at the age of 21 after a chance encounter with children who were looking for an adult in whom they could trust and who would help them overcome the odds. Shanta doesn’t take a salary and works nights to keep the lights on at New Image.  As she says, these are her kids – now 40 of them, between the ages of 5 and 19 years old – and she wouldn’t be able to close the door on them and walk away.

Since opening New Image, Shanta has succeeded in giving her kids hope and a brighter future. In fact, since she opened New Image, not one of her kids has been incarcerated or become pregnant.

I am blessed to have met Shanta as well as her mom, Annette, who helps out at the center on a regular basis.  Once again, I am humbled to have learned from these community heroes, who are championing on behalf of kids who face tough situations that rob them of their innocence when they’re so young.

Thank you, Shanta and Annette (not to forget brother Liam, a.k.a. Gritz), for showing us, in a truly exemplary way,  that each moment can turn into a lifetime of help and hope, of integrity and honor, and of caring and sharing.