CANFIELD, Ohio – Gary Vandetti, who has severe epilepsy, has been working at Youngstown Area Goodwill Industries for 41 years.
“I have gained confidence in what I do and take pride in my work, and that’s all because of what Goodwill has done for me,” Vandetti said Thursday morning during Goodwill’s third annual Mission Breakfast.
Vandetti and his sister, Deborah Duffy, gave testimonials at the annual fundraising breakfast at Tippecanoe Country Club. Its theme was “Unlocking Potential. Creating Opportunity. Changing Lives: A Mission for Good.”
During his time working at Goodwill, Vandetti has sorted items, arranged hangers, hung clothes and disassembled furniture.
“I like to think of my co-workers and myself as one big family,” he said.
Duffy said her brother underwent minor hand surgery at 11 months, developed epilepsy and began experiencing uncontrollable seizures.
“School was a constant struggle for him, with repeated hospitalizations and constant interruptions in his life from seizures,” Duffy said. “However, even with the impossible odds, Gary’s resilience and family support enabled him to graduate from Wilson High School and the special education department in 1979.”
Later that year, Vandetti underwent brain surgery. Two years later, he started working at Goodwill.
“Goodwill has helped Gary become successful in both his personal and his work environments,” Duffy said.
He rarely misses work and says he doesn’t plan to retire for a long time, Duffy said. She acknowledges that Vandetti’s struggles were difficult for the whole family. But the experience brought them closer together.
After seeing her brother’s challenges, Duffy chose a career working in a classroom with multidisabled children, and she started a nonprofit that builds universally designed parks and playgrounds. She also volunteers at Goodwill.
“Just as Gary has inspired me, I hope that his story will inspire others by believing in the power of work,” she said.
Goodwill CEO Shelley Murray said that in 2025, the organization revised its vision and mission statements.
“And it’s a vision for our community – one that’s prosperous, one where individuals can really fully meet their God-given potential through multiple opportunities that are created throughout our community and Goodwill,” she said.
That’s done through a holistic, human-centered wraparound approach to the workforce, the CEO said. But the organization can’t do that work alone. It takes the community, she added.
“It takes the hard work and the resources of all of us who are doing this work together in the community to help benefit those who need it most,” Murray said.
The back of the Thursday breakfast agenda showed Goodwill’s impact. In 2025, 2,768 people were served through its mission services; 175 people volunteered; 1,387 children underwent vision screenings; 175,462 donations were collected across 10 locations; 581,116 customers were served in Goodwill stores; and 3,336 individuals and families were served through its voucher program.
One Goodwill component is the Rise initiative. It focuses on community resilience, trauma-informed care, advocacy and community voice, Murray explained.
“The importance of a collaborative is that it’s multiple voices coming together,” she said. “It’s not just voices inside Goodwill. It’s multiple voices outside of the Goodwill community coming together and sharing resources and talking about how we can benefit the community.”
Another collaborative, called the Assembly for Workforce Solutions, came out of a community needs assessment conducted nearly two years ago. It involves people from various organizations and agencies working to identify resources to help address people’s barriers to employment.
Hasheen Wilson, Goodwill board president, urged attendees to view pledges to the organization as sowing seeds.
“And when we think about sowing the seed into soil, we sow seeds so they can do something at a later point in time,” he said. “And that’s what today is for us and me asking you to consider sowing a seed in good soil …”
Pictured at top: From left are Deborah Duffy, her brother, Gary Vandetti, a Goodwill employee, and Shelley Murray, Youngstown Area Goodwill Industries CEO.