When Alysia Clary was out in public in Auburn, she tended to notice problems with the clothes the children were wearing.
Clothes that clearly didn t fit them. Or were beyond well-worn. Or had holes in them. After noticing these problems for awhile, she wanted to get involved.
Clary, a married mother of two in Baldwinsville, was already donating clothes to students in Onondaga and Madison counties through her nonprofit, Clary s Closet. Since 2019, however, it has donated around 10,000 clothing items to children in the Auburn Enlarged City School District.
The nonprofit was inspired by Clary s time as a parent-teacher association president at a school in the Baldwinsville district. Just as she would in Auburn, she saw children in oversized clothes, or wearing the same thing every day. She spoke with her husband, Mark, about her idea in 2017, and began donating clothes to families in the area later that year. In July 2019, Clary s Closet was incorporated.