Friends,
As I drove up to the Outreach Center at 7:30 AM on Monday, November 21st, there was already a line for our Thanksgiving distribution, and it was raining. I opened the church so that they could shelter from the rain until we started distribution at 9:45. I gave each family a numbered ticket and while wet, they were happy as they knew they were about to receive a full quality Thanksgiving meal for their family.
The distribution went great and thanks to the volunteers who carried hundreds of turkeys and thousands of pounds of fresh vegetables from the Outreach to the Parish Hall, then helped the families carry the baskets to their transportation or carts. As they also did last year, St Anne’s in Garden City donated all the food baskets, loaded with fixings for a Thanksgiving meal as well as other dry goods and for which, we were grateful. I would like to especially recognize Bobby Patch, Terry Hirten, Linda Sarle, Mario and Olivia Fiori, John Fiorini, Christine and Steve Hernandez and Mike and Bridget Ryan. If these names sound familiar, they also coach the soccer clinic and help with the food box, Thanksgiving and Christmas distributions. This is all physical labor and we thank them for their continued support. Some would use their own car or truck to drive elderly people home with the food basket, turkey, and vegetables.
The Catholic Charities Health Van came this week providing flu shots to the community; this is a much needed service since many of our clients do not have transportation and there are no retail pharmacies like Walgreens or CVS within walking distance.
We are distributing many more winter coats this year and the good news is that we have them. Before distribution, we record their names and explain that we can provide only one coat per year so that we can help more families. We do however provide more than one coat and socks to the homeless and people that live in the woods since their coats get wet.
The staff is in full Christmas distribution mode and they are already sorting the new toys and assembling bags of age-appropriate toys for those registered families, literally hundreds of children. The distribution this year is on Thursday the 16th. In the afternoon, after 2:00 PM unregistered families can come to the Outreach and receive toys and food while supplies last but only after showing photo ID, proof of residence, and proof of children; this is on a first come first serve basis.
Board member Rob Cohen and Electric Bricks Digital Marketing, our new web design and development company, created a domain name for the Outreach Center, so going forward please use Noelle’s new email address to correspond to her.
Thank you
Joe
