Best Deal on Wheels

These low income job seekers find out that transportation can make or break their chances at employment.

• • Charity Donations
• • Driving
• • Great Ideas
• Personal Finance

With the goal of providing donated cars to low-income citizens, former food-service executive Hal Colston founded Good News Garage twelve years ago. Since then, the Burlington, Vermont, nonprofit has given away more than 3,000 vehicles to residents of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Vermont.

"If you can't get there, nothing happens. You can't get a job or be part of the community," says Colston, 54. Lucky recipients are proof positive that transportation helps pave the way to a new start. The majority now rely less on government aid, and 83 percent claim that having a car makes holding down a job possible. Good news, indeed.

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From Reader's Digest - May 2008