The Giving Tree
—Photo by STAR SILVA From left, Boundary Community Hospital Administrator Craig Johnson, BCH Marketing and Community Relations, Lauren Kuczka, and BoCo Backpack volunteer, Shirley Anderson, decorate the Giving Tree with ornaments crafted by local elementary schools at the hospital on Monday.
By STAR SILVA
Editor
The Boundary Community Hospital is sponsoring a Christmas Giving Tree in the Outpatient Services Lobby for the benefit of Boundary County children through the BoCo Backpacks program.
Special limited edition, hand-crafted ornaments created by Naples, Mt. Hall and Valley View elementary school students and the local cub scouts and boy scouts will be available for a $10 suggested donation.
One hundred percent of the donations will be used to provide healthy food for children in Boundary County through the BoCo Backpack program and Boundary Community Hospital will make matching contributions based on the number of ornaments distributed.
The BoCo Backpack program began when the Boundary County School District switched to a four-day school week. Some children in the community were at risk for going hungry over the weekend without the assistance of free school lunches, according to Shirley Anderson, member of the BoCo Backpack organization.
“Statistics tell us that one in five children in our county are at risk for going to bed hungry over the weekend,” Anderson said. “The food kits are small enough to fit inside of a backpack, so that it is indiscreet.”
BoCo currently serves around 150 children each week in Boundary County. Anderson said the backpacks are sent home with children every Thursday after school. The kits are purchased from Second Harvest Food Bank. Each kit is packaged in order to ensure proper nutrition is available to the child over the weekend. Kits cost $6 and donations for the program can be dropped off at Trinity Lutheran Church.
“The elementary school-aged children responded well to the program, but the older students at the Boundary County Middle School were embarrassed and wouldn’t bring home the paperwork to their parents,” Anderson explained to the Herald. “So, we had to get creative and make sure that the older students who are participating were completely anonymous. Since we revamped our approach, we’ve been very successful in assisting about 26 families at that school.”
Boundary Community Hospital Administrator Craig Johnson said he was pleased to assist the BoCo Backpack organization with their endeavors.
“As a hospital, when you’re talking about providing food to the community, it’s a concern we share and want to be a part of,” Johnson said.
In addition to the elementary schools, the Boy Scouts and the extended Care Facility also expressed interest in participating in the fundraiser.
Activities Coordinator for the Extended Care Facility, Suzanne Lubin, said that they too were going to get involved.
“We’re going to make ornaments for the tree and all of the proceeds will go to BoCo Backpacks as well,” Lubin said.
The ornaments crafted by the elementary schools are separated by color: Naples Elementary crafted the red, Mt. Hall the green, and Valley View students decorated the white ornaments.
“Each ornament is dated,” Anderson said, “and the idea behind that is that we’re hoping this becomes a tradition for people and that they have a desire to start collecting the ornaments every year.”
The Giving Tree will be on display in the Outpatient Services Lobby during normal business hours at Boundary Community Hospital Nov. 30th through Dec. 30.
In addition, ornaments will be available at the BoCo Backpacks booth at the American Legion Craft Fair on Dec. 2 and 3.
For more information about the BoCo Backpack program, please contact Shirley Anderson at 267-3068.