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Olney HELP has been fortunate with an abundance of community support for our clients that we needed a storage pod! Thank you to SpaceMaker Mobile Storage for providing Olney HELP with a FREE storage pod!  Thanks to Olney Home for Life for hosting a food drive on Saturday, June 13, 2020. OHFL collected 3 cars worth for the pantry!  In response to COVID-19, Olney Rotary partners with Roots to donate $1,600 worth of Roots gift cards. The gift cards will be used by Olney HELP's clients to purchase fresh food.
Olney HELP was awarded $1000 Community Food Rescue (CFR) mini-grant in 2018 for food security efforts. The mini-grant is a collaborative program from Manna Food Center, the Montgomery County Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the Montgomery County Food Council  Great Work Everyone! Together we served 44 families in December 2016 for a total of 93 adults and 84 children. Looking at yearly comparisons, we filled 502 orders in 2016 compared to 493 orders in 2015, not including holiday baskets.
We Still Need Additional Drivers for Olney Help Our collective efforts to find more drivers has brought some results, but we still need more drivers. Please ask around your neighborhood and social circles/groups to see if anyone might be interested in helping. New Pantry Update Work is nearly complete on the new pantry. The site has power, HVAC, siding, insulation, drywall and a door lock has been installed. Painting, electrical fixtures, downspouts and gutters are in progress and two inspections remain before we can start moving shelving into the space. Stay tuned for additional details, including an Open House Celebration. Fall 2016 Community Food Drives and Donations Although the fall food drives and donations keep us busy, they tend to carry us through the spring and sometimes into the summer. Thanks to our community's amazing support we had another successful season of food drives and donations. We collected enough food through food drives to overfill our temporary pantry (Ruth's generously donated garage) and had to request help from several of you to store the extra food until the pantry is complete. A big thank you again to our volunteers who pick-up and deliver food from food drives and those who store food when the pantry is overflowing. Donations have been on the increase this year with nearly double our PayPal donations, a substantial increase for Olney Help selected as people's charity of choice on Amazon Smile, and overall donations are up for 2016 from last year. Thank you to all you Amazon users who selected Olney Help as your charity of choice via Amazon Smile (smile.amazon.com). 2017 Holiday Schedule On the following dates we will not be taking calls or delivering food. This schedule is shared at least once a year with all clients (repeat and new). Monday, May 29 – Memorial Day Tuesday, July 4 – Independence Day Wednesday, November 22 – Day before Thanksgiving Thursday, November 23 – Thanksgiving Day Monday, December 25 – Christmas Day Monday, January 1, 2018 – New Years Day Save the Date! Oakdale Emory Church will be sponsoring a Shrove Tuesday Pancake Dinner to benefit Olney Help on February 28 from 5:30 – 7:00pm. Join us and spread the word to neighbors, friends and local community members! We strive to provide these periodic email updates to keep everyone informed regarding Olney Help activities. Thank you for all you do for Olney Help! |