Lions Club a bright light to darkened eyes in developing countries

If you’ve ever discarded old eyeglasses into one of the local Lions Club donation bins and wondered what happens to them, Lions Bill and Marcia Newyear have the insightful answer.

Bill Newyear, secretary of the Pahrump Valley Lions Club, oversees the eyeglass recycling effort. He or another club member picks up used eyeglasses and sunglasses at collection sites throughout the area.

Newyear pre-sorts the usable eyeglasses, including both prescription and non-prescription sunglasses from the broken or damaged pairs. He carefully bags them into lots of 100, the cases are placed in bags of 33 before they are taken to the Blind Center in Las Vegas where the glasses are further sorted and cleaned.

Eventually, the eyeware is transported to the Lions In Sight warehouse in Vallejo, California, which has been designated by Lions Clubs International as the organization’s recycling center for the Western United States.

Lions In Sight of Nevada and California is a nonprofit corporation founded in the early 1980s by the late Dr. Wayne Cannon with the mission of collecting and recycling used eyeglasses for underprivileged people in developing countries.

“We appreciate all eyeglasses that are collected because our mission is to bring the people from darkness to light in the way of sight,” Linda Griffin, corporate secretary for Lions In Sight of California and Nevada stated.

There are at least three correctional facilities in California and two upcoming in Southern Nevada working with the program.

The inmates are trained on using a lensometer, an instrument used to “read” or “neutralize” the prescriptions of the glasses. This training also helps in providing them with work experience upon their release.

“They do get a certificate of completion once they are trained,” Griffin added.

Lions Club members also read the prescriptions, sort, and pack the glasses in Vallejo before sending them to vision clinics and missions worldwide where teams of licensed ophthalmologists and optometrists volunteer and provide free eye exams and glasses to low-income citizens.

Lion Dr. Bill Iannaccone, chief operating officer of Lions in Sight, said the organization has collected and recycled well over 15 million pairs of eyeglasses being distributed to 67 countries on just about every continent.

Aside from eye missions, many permanent clinics have been established in foreign countries through Lions In Sight.

Marcia Newyear has been on vision missions to Colombia, El Salvador and India over the years as a Lion in Southern California. Now a member of the Summerlin Lions Club, she definitely plans a future trip.

She said the vision clinics are usually held at a school or community center. Depending on the location, like in El Salvador, some of the residents have to walk or be bused.

Eye exams are performed by the visiting doctor, who determines the patients’ prescription. The patients go to one of the volunteers, like Newyear, who match the prescription with one of the many recycled eyeglasses.

“So, when they finally get a prescription that they can actually read or see distance-wise, that’s good,” Marcia Newyear said. “If they can see distance, but can’t read, then we give them readers. We give them free, brand-new readers.”

She said that if there is a difficult prescription/glasses match, especially for children, the doctors will take the child’s information and make the proper lens back here in the states and send them back to the country.

“Anybody that goes on any of these missions comes away with tons of stories of different things, you know. You just break down, you cry, you know these people can’t afford a thing,” Newyear said.

She said while in El Salvador a woman entered the clinic with her Bible and after getting glasses and readers, there was a lot of screaming and wailing outside. The volunteers all ran out to see what happened.

“Her friend said, ‘this is the first time she’s been able to read her Bible,’” Newyear stated.

She added that some of the men who work in the fields have bad cataracts and just giving them sunglasses is a big help.

Bill Newyear doesn’t go on the mission trips like his wife, but says his contribution to Lions In Sight is collecting the eyeglasses, which they occasionally help clean and sort in Las Vegas.

“I would say just from Pahrump, over the past several years, we’ve donated 2,500 pairs of glasses, easily,” Bill Newyear said.

He collects and fills a big plastic bin from Walmart alone every five or six weeks.

“The Lions are more than just gathering glasses,” Bill Newyear said. “There’s a lot of things in Pahrump itself that need to be done and the Pahrump Valley Lions Club could use more hands to do it.”

Before moving to Pahrump, the Newyears were active in the Lions Club in Acton, California, joining to meet new people since that was the only service organization in town.

“I can say without a doubt that our closest friends in the world have come through the Lions Club,” Bill Newyear said.

As a retired teacher, Newyear said he never made much money in his life.

“I think that if you’re in a position to give back, in some fashion, you should give back,” he stated. “I give back and since I can’t afford to do it monetarily, I try and do it in service.”

In addition to the Walmart Vision Center, the Lions have other collection sites in Pahrump at the offices of Dr. G. Dennis Leaks, O.D. at 2120 E. Calvada Blvd.; Dr. Keith Kohorst O.D. at 1141 S. Highway 160, Suite 8 on Postal Road; Clear Vision Eye Center, 1601 E. Basin Ave., Suite 101; Nevada Eye Physicians at 3640 S. Highway 160, Suite 101; and the Pahrump Senior Center located at 1370 W. Basin Ave.

The Pahrump Valley Lions Club is looking for new members. They meet the first and third Tuesday every month at Draft Picks, 1101 S. Highway 160 at 6:30 p.m. You can call Bill Newyear at 661-269-5645 or 775-727-9016 for more information.

The Lions Club is the largest service organization in the world with 1.4 million members in about 46,000 clubs in 208 countries and geographical areas.

They have been involved with vision programs and eyeglass collections almost since its beginning in 1917, according to Lions Clubs International based in Oak Brook, Illinois.