When Rizzo Foundation Board Member, David Jones, contacted me in early June about attending the first RizKids charity event, we immediately penciled in July 21 on our calendars and signed up immediately. This was the inaugural event that Mike and Jodi Rizzo planned for their newly established Rizzo Family Foundation, and this one had two components: charity blackjack, and a barbecue for those who just wanted to eat and mingle.
We knew that even before this event that RizKids was already doing good work and had granted college scholarships to Dewayne McKinnon and Langston Speed as inaugural recipients of the Kim Rizzo Penway Scholarships with $5,000 checks. Additionally, EverybodyWinsDC was their inaugural Riz Kids Partners for Change grant recipients. That grant will help fund the literacy and mentorship program at Van Ness Elementary School. The charity was already giving away money before their first fundraising event.
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We recently upgraded our comment system to improve reliability, performance, and long-term control, and we’re currently running both systems during the transition. This shift moves us away from an external service to a system we run and control directly—meaning we own the content and can continue improving it over time. We’ve also reduced the comment refresh delay from about 30 seconds to 10 seconds, making it much closer to real-time.
We understand there have been frustrations and increased feedback, and we’re actively working to improve things. What we ask is simple: use the system and give it a fair shot. If you run into issues, please submit them through the support form so we can track and fix them properly. Repeated complaints without details don’t help us solve problems—we appreciate your patience as we continue refining the experience.
If you’d like a full side-by-side comparison of the platforms and the reasons behind this decision, please refer to the chart below. This change is being made with the long-term benefit of the entire community in mind.