ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Saturday, November 16, 1996            TAG: 9611180018
SECTION: BUSINESS                 PAGE: A-5  EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER

BUSINESSES SPEND DAY CULLING CASH FOR TAP

THE FUND-RAISING EFFORT was the second annual "TAP Day." Last year, TAP Day raised $3,000, with half the number of businesses participating.

Mark Finkler, a Roanoke veterinarian, was asking his clients not to pay him after he cared for their pets.

He asked instead that they donate what they would have paid him to Total Action Against Poverty, a Roanoke community action agency.

Finkler, with Roanoke Animal Hospital, was not alone; 19 other businesses - both retailers and service companies - in the Roanoke Valley provided customers an opportunity to donate to TAP Thursday. Or some gave a portion of the day's profits to the agency or asked clients and customers to make direct cash donations.

At Lipes Pharmacy, employees wore T-shirts with "Our Business Supports TAP" slogans and signs were posted in the store seeking contributions, said owner Tom Harvey.

The fund-raising effort was the second annual "TAP Day," an idea conceived by Finkler last year.

"TAP is doing a wonderful job for the Roanoke Valley," said Finkler, who serves on TAP's development commission - a group that works to raise money for TAP and spread the word about the agency. "Poverty is a big problem in the Roanoke Valley. I like TAP's idea of giving people a hand up and not a handout."

Thursday, about 90 percent of Finkler's clients agreed to donate to TAP. Some made their checks out to the agency, rather than to him. Some contributed with credit cards; others gave cash.

One client, who owns a landscaping company, asked to be a participating business in next year's TAP Day, Finkler said.

Last year, TAP Day raised $3,000, with half the number of businesses participating, Sara Bemiller, TAP's development director, said Friday. This year's total - which was not yet available but is expected to exceed that amount - will go toward TAP's annual fund-raising campaign, Bemiller said.

The annual campaign, which has a $150,000 goal, supports TAP programs, she said. The campaign each year focuses on particular programs.

For the past two years those programs have been TAP's Transitional Living Center - which provides shelter, food and other services to prepare homeless people for independent living - and the Women's Resource Center, which provides help to abused women and their children.

LENGTH: Medium:   55 lines
ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO:  ROGER HART/Staff. Jane Howard makes out her check to 
          Total Action Against Poverty at Roanoke Animal Hospital as her dog 
          Frosty and husband Jerome wait Thursday. Veterinarian Mark Finkler's
          practice was among the businesses encouraging donations to TAP. 
          color.