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The runway at the Tesla Biohealing Wellness Hotel and Resort in Butler Township had an unusual purpose on Sunday afternoon.
The Ellen O’Brien Gaiser Center held its sixth fashion show in eight years, and while the garments came from local boutiques, the focus of the event stayed fixed on the center’s mission of providing treatment and services to people struggling with addiction.
The October 18 fundraiser gave attendees a full afternoon built around community support. Guests browsed vendor tables, bid in a silent auction, entered basket raffles, and sat down to lunch before the runway show began.
This year, the event sold out. Executive director Joe Mahoney said the fashion show serves as a significant fundraiser for the center while building the community connections that recovery depends on.
“It’s exciting to see because it really does show that it takes a whole community, a whole village,” Mahoney said. “We have support from some businesses and nonprofits and friends, families and neighbors that pull together and create this network for people in recovery.”
Six Months at Gaiser Changed One Family
Before the models walked, the audience heard from Renee Golubski, a former client approaching her 10th year of sobriety. Her story explains why long-term residential care matters.
She spent 27 years in addiction and went to rehab several times, but she said she never stayed long enough to truly detox. The Gaiser Center gave her that chance.
“As soon as I went to Gaiser, that is really where I started to learn and embrace recovery,” she said. She credited the center’s structure. Counselors got to know her over the long term and helped her work through her problems.
Approved family members and friends were encouraged to visit, and she was allowed to attend meetings and spend time with her family. When her three months neared an end, she begged to stay another month, and the center funded it.
She stayed six months before returning to her parents’ house, and she said she learned how to cope with the ups and downs of life.
Her father, Joe Golubski, knows both sides of that story. He also struggled with addiction and is now 32 years sober. He wanted his daughter to get sober but struggled to connect with her.
Through the work of the Gaiser Center, they reconnected and now enjoy sobriety together. Their story captures something treatment providers see often. Recovery rarely stays private. It moves through entire families, and when it takes hold, it can repair the relationships addiction damaged.
Fundraising That Funds Detox and Expansion
The Gaiser Center’s fashion show is one example of how addiction recovery services in smaller communities stay alive. Government funding and insurance reimbursements rarely cover the full cost of care, especially for people without coverage.
Nonprofit providers bridge the difference with events, donations, and local partnerships. In Golubski’s case, that bridge was literal, a funded extra month of treatment when insurance ran out.
The center is now planning to extend that model further southwest into Greene County, where Mahoney said the lack of resources mirrors Butler County’s own struggles.
The plan is to offer withdrawal management at a nonhospital level of care, which is the medical term for a detox program that does not require a hospital stay.
Detox is the first door into treatment, and it is often the most expensive to provide. A nonprofit funded by community events is exactly the kind of provider that can keep that door open for people who cannot pay.
For families in Butler County and Greene County facing treatment costs, free and low cost rehab options in Pennsylvania include nonprofit providers funded by exactly this kind of community effort, along with state-funded programs and facilities that accept Medicaid.
If you or someone you love needs help in western Pennsylvania, the door that fundraisers like this one keep open is worth walking through.
Rehabs.com lists affordable rehab centers across the nation. Call
800-914-7089
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to get more information about treatment options.
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