Letter to the Editor: Help, Inc. - Thank You - 02/06/2012

Details

Published on Monday, 06 February 2012 13:50

Dear Editor,

Greetings from HELP, Inc.

HELP, Inc. of Elk City thanks the community for their unprecedented generosity.  As the old National Guard armory rose from the ashes, HELP pitched in with five other non-profits with the same vision.   The result is a greatly expanded food ministry, covering three counties. With the help of the Oklahoma Regional Food Bank, the Elk City Bar-S Foods, and the Elk City Wal-mart Supercenter, we served over 300 families monthly in 2011.

Churches and organizations giving monetary donations monthly are:  First Baptist Church, First Assembly of God Church, Antioch Christian Church, First Christian Disciples of Christ Church, Church of God, and the First Christian Builders Class, United Methodist Thrift Shop, and the United Fund of Elk City.   

Other churches and organizations donating funds were the First Presbyterian Church, the United Methodist Church, the Seventh Day Adventist Church, the United Methodist Lois Smith Circle and the Faith Class, the Elk City Ministerial Alliance, the Debra Sunday School class, the Disciples’ Women class, FEMA, Cultus Club, and the American Legion.  

Corporate donors included Chesapeake Energy, ExxonMobil Corporation, ConocoPhillips Corporation, Apache Corporation, and EOG Resources, Inc.   

Individual donors  were  Dr. and Mrs. L.V. Baker,  Rev. Roy Rowlan, Matt and Natalie Rule Burns, Ron and Carol Sloan, John Polcyn family, John Jones, Nola Hunt, Dave and Marsha Dickinson, Joe and Etta Britton, Randy Thomas, Bill and Lois Hubbard, June Miller, Emma and Lynn Brewer, Carson Culver, Sean Proctor, Mike Walllis and Mary Ann Gleeson, 

Schools have conducted fall food drives. Our gratitude to the Independent School District of Sweetwater for their food and cash donation.  We thank the Elk City Grandview 5th & 6th grade center, Fairview 3rd & 4th grade center, and the Northeast 1st & 2nd grade center. Also contributing food and cash donations were the Merritt FCCLA and the 4th grade classes.  The Elk City Honor Society from the High School conducted a spring and fall food collection.  The Elk City Key Club came and helped sort out all the food collected in the fall food drives

We appreciate Weatherly RCA and Elk City AT&T businesses that had food drives at Christmas.

Professional services and supplies have been donated by Hargis Electric, Homeland Foods, United Supermarkets, Walls Bargain Center, Youngblood Heating and Air Conditioning, and Currell’s Do It Center.

The HELP Board of Directors challenged the Elk City Ministerial Alliance to “adopt a food item” such as peanut butter, soup, sugar, etc.  Those who met the challenge were First Christian Disciples of Christ, Elk City Community Church, Church of the Nazarene, Main Street Baptist Church, Eastside Baptist Church, United Methodist Church, First Baptist Church, First Presbyterian Church, Church of God, and Antioch Christian Church.  

A special thanks to the Elk City Wal-mart Supercenter for providing a monthly average of 10,000 pounds of mostly perishable but wonderful food.  It is dangerous to start naming names like this, but it is so important to us that we are taking the leap and apologizing for any names we have left off.  

We want to thank Jim Rule who saw the vision for the facility, planned the space, purchased materials, and worked so hard to see it built.  Thank you to Larry Anthes, Bill Hubbard and Roy Ezzell who worked with him many days.

A huge thank you goes to all of our current volunteers: those who take the trailer to Wal-Mart 3 times a week and pick up food, those who receive and put the food away, those who pre-sack the groceries, those who set-up and dispense the food and work in the office twice a week.  Without the volunteers this ministry would not be available.

We thank you and we invite you to come and see the food pantry in action.  We would love to give you a tour through the whole armory.  We are there to serve the public from 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays.  Volunteers can choose from several  opportunities:  driving a pickup and trailer to Wal-mart and picking up food, stocking shelves, sacking groceries, working in the office or handing out food, as frequently or as infrequently as you would like to be scheduled.  

We always need donations of paper grocery sacks and egg cartons.  If you or your group would like to adopt a food item, please let us know.  

With your continued support, HELP, Inc. can keep helping Western Oklahomans through the difficult times in their lives.  The blessings are endless…

HELP, Inc. 
Board of Directors