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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Spokane Valley clothing bank tailored for those in need

Clothing bank manager Annie Meyer, center, talks about the work at Spokane Valley Partners as volunteers sort and prepare clothes Monday. The clothing bank is inside the SVP center in Spokane Valley. (Jesse Tinsley)

There was the day when a man came in off the street, carrying a 2-week-old baby dressed in a toddler-size T-shirt and wrapped in a towel instead of a diaper.

Annie Meyer, the clothing bank manager at Spokane Valley Partners, met the new dad in the lobby at Spokane Valley Partners and helped him find baby clothes, diapers and baby supplies.

“He just sat there and bawled because we helped him,” Meyer said.

Or there was the woman who showed up with a car full of donations, because she was moving back to Mexico. Two years earlier she had gotten dressed with the help of the clothing bank and now she wanted to give back to the place that helped her.

“That happens a lot,” Meyer said. “People remember that we helped them and they give back when they can.”

Meyer has the mannerism of a longtime volunteer, the way she walks through the building chatting, looking like she’s been there forever, but she’s only been at Valley Partners for a little less than a year.

She volunteers at least eight hours a day, and in February she was asked to replace the clothing bank manager, who was retiring.

“I said they should pick someone who’d been here longer, but they wanted me,” Meyer said.

She moved to Spokane Valley five years ago from Orting – which she describes as a small town at the foot of Mount Rainier.

There, she raised three daughters “home schooling and living in the woods” and she worked for a church for 23 years. She moved to Spokane Valley with her husband to help take care of his mother.

She’d never been to Spokane before, but she likes living here.

“Things are slower here, and people are polite,” Meyer said. “But I liked the rain in Orting.”

She’s halfheartedly working on getting her daughters and 12 grandchildren to also move here.

“They say there is too much sun and too much snow here,” Meyer said, laughing.

When Meyer said yes to the manager’s position, she was asked to look for ways in which the clothing bank could work with other departments at Valley Partners.

That led to the creation of what she calls “emergency baskets” – prepacked kits with clothes, diapers, toiletries and other necessities for children.

The baskets are for families with children who are fleeing domestic violence situations or are homeless.

There’s also a prepacked kit with household goods – plates, cups, a coffee maker, just the most basic stuff.

Meyer said families getting out of domestic violence situations often have absolutely nothing.

“They have an empty apartment,” Meyer said. “That’s it.”

She works closely with domestic violence counselors from the YWCA trying to find furniture for women and children who are victims of domestic violence.

As word is getting out that Valley Partners holds on to a crib here and a bed there, donations are beginning to come in.

“We didn’t do much for domestic violence before,” Meyer said.

The clothing bank now has a separate dress-for-success room, where men and women can find professional clothes and shoes.

Meyer also opens the clothing bank for two hours on Fridays for the benefit of men who have just been released from prison and are in a re-entry program at Valley Partners.

Spend a few minutes with Meyer and it is clear she is excited about giving and helping.

She talks about filling needs and jumping in to help out, “plugging another hole” as she puts it.

Her attitude is to rise above the few clients who try to abuse the system.

“I don’t let that get to me,” Meyer said. “My heart is as strong as it was a year ago.”

But the clients do get to her.

Worry brings tears to her eyes when she talks about them.

“When you see that mom with her kids and a backpack, and you know that’s all they have,” Meyer said, wiping her eyes. “I worry. How can you not worry about them?”

Meyer leans on a cane these days doing her best to protect a knee she hurt when she tripped off the porch.

The doctor told her to stay home and rest it.

But she still comes in every day.

“For me, giving is where my heart is,” Meyer said. “If I got paid, it would turn into work and that’s not as much fun.”