Fund on the move
Today is move-in day for the Christmas Bureau. While the volunteers are excited to get the charity effort going after months of planning, it will be a cold, long day.
“I’m more excited than nervous,” said Mike Reilly, volunteer bureau chairman. “It’s good to get into high gear. There’s a little bit of anxiety. So many things have to come together. One of those is the funding. But people rise to meet the challenges.”
Donations to The Spokesman-Review Christmas Fund pay for Christmas fixings for needy families.
Donations of $5,075, including $2,500 from Redhill Forest Products, of Hayden Lake, brought the Christmas Fund to $48,394.25. Much more is needed to reach the $485,000 goal, the amount bureau organizers estimate will be needed to pay for the toys and food vouchers they will begin to distribute Thursday.
The setup crew plans to gather at 7:30 this morning at the Spokane County Fair and Expo Center.
“We’ll get the coffee going so when the volunteers get there they can have their coffee and get to work,” Reilly said.
The first semi-truck full of toys will be backed into the building at 9 a.m. The bureau uses the Agricultural Building at the fairgrounds. Since trucks will be unloading all day, bureau organizers won’t turn on the heat until tonight.
Even with the help of a forklift and about 50 volunteers, unloading five trucks full of toys will take about four hours. Then the boxes must be sorted into age groups for which the toys inside are intended. It sounds simple, but when it involves 17,000 toys the task takes hours.
A lot of equipment also must be unloaded today.
Trucks loaned to the charity will deliver everything from 2,000 gift bags, which have been stored at Catholic Charities’ offices downtown, to the 20,000 books that Volunteers of America will be giving out to children. The bureau’s 35 tables, 170 chairs, commercial coffee makers and kitchen supplies will be brought from warehouses, and one truck will deliver 20 computers from the Assumption Parish basement.
“The first two days are tough,” Reilly said. “It takes a lot of physical work to unload the toys, and set up the tables and chairs. The walls on the toy rooms will also start going up today after the trucks leave.”
Christmas Fund donations of all amounts are welcome. Following are the donors and their donations:
Daniel Green, president of Redhill Forest Products, sent $2,500 and a note: “God has blessed us in so many ways. I am sure that as the year progresses, we take many of these blessings for granted. Thank you for your efforts in making sure that this money gets to people that need the help. Merry Christmas and God bless all of you.”
Bob and Deborah Glaza, of Spokane Valley, donated $200, as did Spokane Media Federal Credit Union and Carol and Karl Speltz, of Spokane, in the names of their grandchildren, Matthew, Joey and Benjamin.
Fae Bowers and Maureen Latham, of Spokane, sent $150.
John and Joan Cooper, of Veradale, donated $100, as did Donald Head, Avery Mahffey and Leslie Beckstead, Otto and Shirley Stevens, Nancy Stone and Jill Fiedler, and an anonymous donor, all of Spokane, and Joan Casey, of Priest River, Idaho.
The Frost family, of Spokane, gave $50 in memory of Jack E. Frost.
David and Jacqueline Vasquez, of Spokane Valley, donated $50, as did William and Gelene Griffiths, of Nine Mile Falls, and an anonymous donor, of Spokane.
An anonymous donor, of Spokane, sent $25.