“Ohana means family. And family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.”

These words from Disney’s 2002 animated movie “Lilo & Stitch” have inspired and become the bedrock of Lauren Sanders’ work helping children who enter the foster care system.

A longtime Daytona Beach resident, Sanders three years ago started 1 Ohana 1 Community, Inc. — a nonprofit organization that helps provide for foster children, foster parents and birth parents looking to reunite with their children.

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And through her work, for which The News-Journal recently recognized her as a Hometown Hero, she hopes the “community (will) come together and realize that these foster kids cannot be forgotten about, that they are not just a number or a statistic.”

Lifelong wish to be a foster parent came ‘unexpectedly’

Ever since she was young, Sanders knew she wanted to be a foster parent.

“And that happened unexpectedly in 2019,” she said. “I took custody of my little cousin. So I learned real fast what it was like to be a foster parent with no warning.”

She and her wife, Kris Sanders, have cared for 18 foster kids and have one adopted son, who is 20 years old and has aged out of the system.

“We saw the things that happen when kids get taken away from their families,” Kris Sanders said of both their time in law enforcement. Kris Sanders worked as a police officer in Daytona Beach, while Lauren Sanders worked as a police officer in Ormond Beach.

“When we were foster parents and we had kids in our house, they would come with nothing or with just a little bit of stuff that didn’t fit or was dirty,” Kris Sanders said. “So (Lauren) decided to start piling up clothes and helping out other foster parents in the community, and it just snowballed from there.”

Work as a nonprofit and helping kids in crisis

The most important part of helping kids entering the foster care system, Lauren Sanders said, is providing necessary support for those “who are not meant to take care of themselves.”

When foster parents, licensing agencies or the Florida Department of Children and Families reach out to Sanders, she learns as much information about the child as possible in order to create a care package designed to satisfy the specific child’s needs.

Items vary from child to child but often include basic hygiene products, bedding items, a week’s worth of new and used clothes, of which underwear, shoes and socks are the most needed, Sanders said in an interview last month.

“If a kid comes in and the foster care parent calls us at 3 a.m. and says the kid came with nothing, we are available,” she said. “We’re going to make that care package and get it to them as fast as we can.”

While children are brought into foster care for a variety of reasons — ranging from a family’s financial struggle to an abusive relationship — meeting those kids’ needs as soon as possible is 1 Ohana’s primary objective.

“Too often, due to no fault of their own, children are removed from their homes because they are unsafe,” according to the Florida Department of Children and Families website.

“And you never know if it’s going to be your family member,” Sanders said.

When it began in 2021, the nonprofit was a thrift store operation, which was open Tuesday-Saturday and sold donated goods to foster families.

But that, Sanders said, “just didn’t hit off” due to financial difficulties, and the nonprofit started to change its operation.

“So we decided to do office days — three days a week. But then inflation hit, and that took a toll on us, too. We had to drop it down to just two days a week out here.”

But even though they work twice a week at the 1 Ohana office in Ormond Beach, they are dedicated 24/7 to the nonprofit.

This year, 1 Ohana also began its clothing shop, which is open for any family in need — not just foster families. They can sign up once a month and can get up to three free outfits for each child. Most of the clothes are for young children.

“The younger ones, I say they’re the easier care packages, because a baby can’t tell you what they like or don’t like,” Sanders said. “We just get what size diapers, what formula they’re on and if there is any immediate need they have.”

She added: “They need these comfort items, they need these hygiene products, they need clothes, and they need people to be in their corner. I just want everybody to come together for them.”

Fighting hate along the way

Beyond the logistical and business challenges that came with starting a new operation, Sanders has also dealt with discrimination regarding her marriage to Kris.

One such instance involved an organization that provided socks for 1 Ohana.

“It was great, and we were able to help all these kids,” Sanders said. “And then, all of a sudden, on their Facebook page they said, ‘We do not support LGBTQ organizations.’”

She and her wife also heard from another organization that “we weren’t needed and that we weren’t welcomed.”

“I’m sorry, but if anybody wants to do anything for foster kids, we don’t have enough organizations for them. There can never be enough for them, because they need as much support as they can.”

Even though the discrimination ultimately led to other opportunities for the nonprofit, Sanders said “it’s hard” to go through these situations.

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“It’s not supporting me, it’s supporting the children,” Sanders said. “Either you like our mission and you understand that we’re here to help these kids, or you don’t. And everybody should want to help the kids.

“We’re going into 2024. I mean, things should be different,” she added. “I can only do so much as a nonprofit, the churches can only do so much as churches and businesses can only do so much as businesses. But when we come together, we can do so much more.”

Born in Ohio and raised in West Palm Beach, Sanders moved to Volusia County as a teen and has been here “for more than half my life.”

Her first career was dedicated to law enforcement. She spent five years working for the Ormond Beach Police Department.

“I just always wanted to help people,” Sanders said. “I knew I’d be good at it.”

She retired early due to medical reasons but knew she wanted to continue giving back to the community. The transition into creating a nonprofit was not easy.

“It wasn’t on my mind right away,” Sanders said. “I actually went into an identity crisis.”

Wanting to be more than the police officer she had become known for, she returned to school and earned two degrees: one in business and another in early child education. She also worked in early childhood centers prior to starting 1 Ohana.

“So I kind of decided I wanted to put them all together, and I took the business aspect and decided to just start this organization.”

‘She is an amazing person’

Sanders’ wife, Kris, has been with the nonprofit since the beginning, working as its executive director.

“I’m pretty much the muscle,” Kris Sanders said of helping with care packages and putting together fundraisers.

But Lauren, she said, is the “brains behind it all.”

By the time Lauren founded 1 Ohana, her wife they had “stacks and bins from floor to ceiling in our house, with different sized clothes so we could help everybody.”

Kris Sanders said her wife’s Hometown Hero acclaim is “absolutely deserved.”

“She is an amazing person,” Kris Sanders said. “She does nothing but give back to the community, she fights for these kids … to make sure that they get what they need.”

1 Ohana had created about 75 care packages for foster kids in 2023 as of Dec. 14, according to Lauren Sanders.

According to the Florida Department of Health, there were approximately 24,200 kids per 100,000 in the foster care system in 2022.

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“I would say that all those kids are my heroes, because they keep me going,” Lauren Sanders said.

Those who want to help 1 Ohana’s operations can drop off clothes, hygiene products and other items at the Ormond Beach office at 1042 N. U.S. Highway 1, Suite 7 (where the clothing shop is located).

Direct donations can also be made on its website: 1ohana1communityinc.org.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Hometown Hero helps foster kids, parents through 1 Ohana 1 Community