A Thanksgiving Gift of Service Grows

As we all navigate this ever changing 2020 season, for many in our Salem community the need for food never changed. Sadly, the ability for local organizations to offer assistance was deeply impacted due to extra relief efforts in the aftermath of area wildfires. Normal funding resources for Thanksgiving Food Boxes were utilized early, leaving many local schools at a loss of how to help their families during the holiday season. This is where six Salem Academy seniors stepped in.

As the need in the community became apparent, Hannah Warde, Natalie McMullen, Connor Benson, Cody Manning, Gabe Vineyard, and Tyler Palanuk decided to help. Their goal? Provide 5 Thanksgiving food boxes to each of the 10 elementary schools in the Salem Academy/McKay High School feeder area. Salem Leadership Foundation agreed to help with the raising of funds by reaching out to churches located in those areas. The Salem Academy seniors would shop for food to build the boxes, sort the food, and distribute to all 10 schools.

As the idea took shape and schools expressed their concerns regarding COVID 19 protocol, a new idea evolved that would reduce personal contact. It was decided that gift certificates would be purchased for each family from Mega Foods for their “Ultimate Holiday Meal Deal” allowing the family to purchase a 10-12lb turkey, stuffing mix, gravy mix, 5lbs of potatoes, 2 cans of vegetables, a package of dinner rolls and a butter spread. And the donations came pouring in!

• Community and Partners of East Salem (a Community Partnership Team that partner with the local schools) was the first to donate $500.00 to this project.
• Salem Leadership Foundation reached out to 20 churches and raised another $1,000.00.
• Salem Harvest, a non-profit that helps provide fresh produce to the Marion Polk Food Share, donated 270 bags of fresh apples.
• Roth’s IGA on Lancaster donated 10 boxes of fresh product to accompany the certificates.
• AMES Inc. donated 50 - 3.5 gallon buckets to hold the produce and apples for a no contact pick up for the families.

All the items were compiled with packets that included local resources for the families along with the meal certificate. The Salem Academy seniors spent three days sorting produce into smaller boxes, making resource packets, and delivering the items to the schools.

The result? As with the five loaves and fishes, God once again multiplied what was originally given to impact even more families!

• Seventy families (twenty families over the goal!) were provided with meal certificates, apples, fresh produce, and resource packets.
• As other churches became aware of the need through the above efforts, they also organized Thanksgiving Food Boxes from their congregations and another 60 families were provided with Thanksgiving Food Boxes.
• As this news spread, other areas of town took notice and 41 additional families were serviced.

In the end, $1,500 was raised and 171 families were provided with a Thanksgiving meal throughout Salem. What a Thanksgiving blessing!