More than 100 volunteers gathered at St. John’s Lutheran School on Tuesday to help pack 37,000 meals to be distributed to The Salvation Army food pantry network including pantries in Marysville, Milford Center, Plain City and Richwood. The Care United Event was sponsored by The United Way of Union County and included a pantry drive that collected 54 boxes of food and personal needs items. Other Care United events around the county included cookie baking for military care packages and Red Cross blood drives along with landscaping and beautifying projects in Richwood. Care United events are held year round to pair volunteers with community service projects.
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Editor’s note: The following release is submitted by Corinne Bix of the United Way of Union County.
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Pantry shelves across Union County are a little fuller today thanks to a meal packing event and pantry drive sponsored by The United Way of Union County.
The Care United event was held at St. John’s Lutheran School and more than 37,000 meals were packaged through the Outreach Meal Packing Program. Packages of oatmeal and cheesy rice were distributed to The Salvation Army food pantry network including Plain City, Milford Center, Marysville, and Richwood. Volunteers included groups from Memorial Health, Union County Board of DD, McCarthy and Cox, Midwest Express, John Deere Training Center, Edward Jones, Nationwide, Crazy Richard’s Peanut Butter, St. John’s students and many more.
Additionally, the pantry drive filled 54 boxes that were distributed to eight of United Way’s partner agencies. Non-perishable food items were collected by the Ohio Helpers 4H Club. Other items were contributed by Honda Federal Credit Union and other individuals. The collection included 628 food items, 585 personal need items, 41 baby care items, 68 packs of wipes and more than 1,100 diapers.
“It was an awesome day, and we had a great group of hardworking volunteers,” Corinne Bix, Campaign Director for The United Way of Union County, said.
In Richwood, Care United volunteers helped mulch and landscape throughout the village including the North Union Veterans Memorial, Richwood North Union Public Library, and First United Methodist Church. Many of the volunteers were North Union high school students. Painting on the county’s third Born Learning Trail was started at the Richwood Park. The Born Learning Trail is a series of 10 interactive signs that offer fun learning activities for young children and their families.
In Marysville, two workplace groups baked a total of 124 dozen cookies. Honda employees utilized the YMCA kitchen for military care packages and Union Rural Electric employees baked at their facility for the American Red Cross blood drives.
Other Care United events included introducing new volunteers to Union County Neighbor to Neighbor. UWUC’s newest partner agency grew out of Care United’s predecessor, Community Care Day. The former one-day event joined volunteers with area service projects (community and individual) countywide. The popularity of the event encouraged a small group of volunteers to answer the question, “What would it be like if Community Care Day was all year long?”
Neighbor to Neighbor volunteers were able to complete 17 individual projects around the county including window washing and light landscaping. For more information about Neighbor to Neighbor those interested may contact ucn2nohio@gmail.com or 1-877-354-8262.
“While this was our largest Care United event of the year with close to 200 volunteers, this is not our first nor our last for 2019,” Bix explained, “We want Care United events to be flexible to accommodate different projects and different sizes and groups of volunteers.”
Projects completed earlier this month include mulching at Partners Park by a team from Scotts Miracle-Gro and landscaping at Daily Needs Assistance of Plain City by Tolles students. Upcoming summer projects include refreshing the Born Learning Trails at Mill Valley South and Eljer Park along with some work at UWUC’s partner agency, Discovery Riders Therapeutic Riding Center.
For more information about United Way of Union County, those interested may contact uwuc.corinne@gmail.com or 937-644-8381.