Amy Perez’s legacy inspires domestic violence prevention efforts in Bucks County

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A Bucks County-based organization dedicated to domestic violence prevention and education is hosting its 11th annual Walk to Remember this Sunday at Tyler State Park in Newtown.

Organized by Amy’s Kisses Foundation, the walk honors the lives of Amy Perez and her two children, Molly and Gregory, who were killed by Perez’s estranged husband in 2011.

Proceeds from the event will benefit the foundation’s A Bowl Full of Hearts program, which teaches preschool through second-grade students about understanding, building and sustaining healthy relationships.

“We just want to start the conversation as early as possible about what constitutes a good friend, when you should walk away, and you don’t have to be friends with everyone or someone who doesn’t make you happy,” said Jill Perez Gobora, Amy’s sister and co-founder and executive director of the foundation. “You have the power to make a choice.”

Perez Gobora wrote “A Bowl Full of Hearts,” a picture book used in the educational programming Amy’s Kisses provides to students throughout Bucks County. The foundation partners with A Woman’s Place, the county’s only domestic violence organization, to teach children how to identify 10 signs of a healthy relationship.

“Even though they’re not in a romantic relationship, it starts with your friends, and what’s acceptable in a friendship will grow into what you will accept, hopefully, in a romantic partner and dating,” Perez Gobora said. “So it all starts now. It starts with keeping your hands to yourself. It starts with, ‘If I don’t like what’s going on, I’m going to find someone else to play with, or makes me feel better.’”

In addition to its focus on domestic violence prevention, Amy’s Kisses also provides scholarships to students in need. Since its founding in 2012, the foundation has donated $250,000 to students from the region and throughout the country. The organization has also recently partnered with Project HOME in North Philadelphia to support its college access services.

Perez Gobora said the foundation’s emphasis on education is aligned with Amy’s legacy and love of learning.

Amy Perez grew up in Havertown, Delaware County, graduating at the top of her class at Haverford High School. She was a member of the academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa as an undergraduate at Cornell University, and earned a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business. At the time of her death, she was building up a business dedicated to tutoring students for SAT and college prep tests.

Amy and her daughter, Molly, who was 10 years old at the time of her death, were in a book club together, and Gregory, who was 8 years old, was a “sweet little boy,” Perez Gobora said.

“I feel like they would be extremely proud of what we’re doing in their memory, and they would be on board and be helping us if they were on this earth with us today,” she said. “It would be a family organization, just like it is now, and they would just be a part of it.”

Perez Gobora said she and Patti Cush, Amy’s lifelong best friend, co-founded the organization in 2012 as a way to cope with the devastating loss.

“I actually felt like I can’t just sit and look at my parents grieve without doing something productive in their memory,” Perez Gobora said. “It just could not end like this.”

She said founding the organization has helped the family take action in the midst of their grief.

“We still think about them every day. Not a day goes by that they’re not in our hearts and in our minds,” she said. “At least we have something we can physically do and we can help people, and I know they’re smiling down at us, and I know they’re with us, and they have our back.”

Cush, who attended Haverford High School with Amy, echoed Perez Gobora’s sentiment.

“The loss of Amy, Molly and Gregory left this hole in the world,” she said. “And I think all we can do is really fill it with love, fill it with kindness.”

Perez Gobora said the community in Bucks County, where she currently lives, as well as friends and loved ones from throughout the region and where Amy lived in Westchester County, New York, have been “so supportive.” Survivors of domestic abuse have also reached out to be involved, she said.

“Everyone comes, and it’s grown, and it’s just a really good feeling of all the different areas of Amy’s life, and my life, and my kids’ lives,” she said. “Everyone’s on board for this cause and for Amy, Molly and Gregory, and it’s just such a wonderful feeling, and it’s just a community event where everyone is just there for the same reason, and it’s very heartwarming.”

Participants can register for the walk ahead of time or on site this Sunday at 10 Stable Mill Road in Richboro. Registration opens at 8:15 a.m., and the walk kicks off at 9:15 a.m. The price for walkers is $35 and includes a T-shirt and refreshments.

Anyone interested in learning more about Amy’s Kisses Foundation can visit the organization’s website.