TAMPA BAY – The Tampa Bay Lightning honored Fred and Laura Lay as the 30th Lightning Community Heroes this season during the first period of tonight’s game versus the Dallas Stars. The Lay’s, who received a $50,000 donation from the Lightning Foundation and the Lightning Community Heroes program, will donate to A Kid’s Place.
As owners of a successful Tampa based construction company, Construction Services Inc. (CSI), the Lay’s created a philanthropic arm of the company called CSI Cares to encourage all of their employees to volunteer and give back to the community. To date, CSI Cares has donated over a million dollars back into the community and contributed over 960 hours of community service to charities including Junior Achievement, American Cancer Society, Friends of Joshua House, and Children’s Home Society. This love for giving back has inspired other local businesses and organizations to find ways to volunteer and give back to the community.
Much of Fred and Laura’s passion lies in assisting children and youth to reach their full potential through mentoring, education, vocational training, scholarships and emotional and financial support. Their work has eased the suffering of abused and neglected children in foster care, encouraged and enabled at-risk youth to achieve greater academic and social success, and provided tools, training and inspiration for young entrepreneurs to pursue their passions. They work mainly with the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay to help those in the community facing serious life challenges or trauma from sexual assault, suicidal thoughts, domestic violence, financial distress and other emotional or situational problems. The Lay’s also serve on the board and volunteer at A Kid’s Place. Participation for the Lays is not just showing up it’s actually helping out whether that be financially or actually doing the physical work.
Fred and Laura Lay become the 352nd Lightning Community Hero since Jeff and Penny Vinik introduced the Lightning Community Hero program in 2011-12 with a $10 million, five-season commitment to the Tampa Bay community. Through this evening’s game, in total, the Lightning Foundation has granted $17.7 million to more than 400 different nonprofits in the Greater Tampa Bay area. During the summer of 2016, the Vinik’s announced that the community hero program will give away another $10-million over the next five seasons.
