Charity Beach Cleanup Honors 2 Local Young People After Tragedy

WESTHAMPTON BEACH, NY — Coronavirus can't keep the community from coming together to help causes that have touched their hearts.

On October 4, the "Inlet 2 Inlet Charity Beach Cleanup" has been organized to benefit Live Your Cor and Dana Barrett Strong. The beach cleanup competition takes place from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. along the 15 miles of coastal beaches stretching from Cupsogue County Park to the Shinnecock Inlet.

The funds are being raised in honor of two young people who've touched the hearts of the many in the community who've loved them.

Every year, the community comes together to remember Westhampton Beach High School graduate Cory Hubbard, who died in 2014 after he was struck by a hit-and-run driver while away at college.

He was just 22 years old.

This year, the coronavirus put the brakes on the annual "Live Your Cor" fundraiser. After Cory's death, his parents Ralph and Holly Hubbard created The Live Your Cor Foundation, which provides funds for local families facing adversity.

Dana Barrett, 29, suffered a severe spinal injury in a pool accident in 2019. After being airlifted to Stony Brook University Hospital it was determined she suffered a C2 fracture, resulting in paralysis from the neck down and the inability to breathe on her own, a GoFundMe page said.

Both Cory and Dana grew up with a love of the beach, the water, of sports and sunshine and summer.

In the face of tragedy, the community has opened their hearts to help, both raising funds to help others in Cory's memory, and to support Dana in her recovery.

And despite COVID-19, the Live Your Cor Foundation and The Dana Barrett Supplemental Needs Trust have teamed up for the beach cleanup to benefit both organizations and their missions.

The Westhampton Beach Village Marina will serve as headquarters for registration and also as the weigh station. Check-in takes place between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m., followed by the beach cleanup until 4 p.m. The event will include raffles, merchandise for sale, and hot soup and snacks by Starr Boggs during registration times. Teams can win prizes donated by local businesses based on their average per person poundage collected, as well as the total team sponsorship dollars raised.

Registration costs $25 per person and includes an event T-shirt and refreshments along with garbage bags and gloves.

To satisfy state and local COVID-19 guidelines, teams from 2 to 8 persons can pre-register and be assigned a beach to clean. No more than 50 persons will be sent to a single beach location and social distancing between groups on the beach is required.

"This will be a great chance for our growing community to gather safely outdoors and do something wholesome for multiple worthy causes," organizers said.

Teams can register here.

Holly Hubbard said Jack Clark of Starr Boggs was instrumental in organizing the event.

"This is a true collaborative production between Live Your Cor, the Dana Barrett Supplemental Needs Trust and Relic," Clark said. Relic is a T-shirt company that donates to many local efforts. "It's about our greater community getting together to do something for the local environment while raising money for worthy causes," he said.

The hope, he said, is that the event can springboard toward other projects and collaborations in the future.

Dana and Cory, Hubbard said, "definitely knew each other." And for two young people who loved the water and the beach, the event, meant to keep the beach pristine, is a natural, she added. "Cory was a big surfer. He loved the beach. This a really good thing, in so many ways."

The coronavirus, Hubbard added, has sparked great need in the community. Recently, she said, Live Your Cor donated to an effort by Brian Tymann to help food pantries. Live Your Cor also helped families who were struggling to pay their mortgages and feed their children. Those acts of caring are always done anonymously to help community members during their darkest hours.

Her son, Hubbard said, would love to know that so much good is being done in his memory. "One woman we helped sent me a letter that said, 'You changed my life,'" Hubbard said. "We were so psyched. That was really great. It made us feel like we are doing something right. It feels amazing."

Fundraising has taken many forms, so that the efforts to help others can continue during the pandemic: Troi Kandler, who used to work at the legendary Magic's Pub, is working with the owners of Westhampton T-Shirts, who announced recently that they will be closing soon, to create recreations of T-shirts with the popular Magic's logo. The shirts will sell for $20 and benefit Live Your Cor, Hubbard said.

Dana, too, will benefit from the event: She is currently at New Beginnings, a community center for traumatic brain injury, and continuing to make strides, Hubbard said.

The event is a win-win for all, Hubbard added.

"This is something families can do together," she said. "They haven't been able to get out. This is something they can do safely, outside — and help great causes, too."

And coincidentally, Hubbard said, the event takes place two days before Cory's birthday. "This is our 'Happy Birthday' to him," she said.

This article originally appeared on the Westhampton-Hampton Bays Patch