With the holidays approaching, Keizer residents have an opportunity to volunteer and donate items to local families in this year’s edition of the Giving Baskets program.
Every winter, dozens of businesses, organizations and community members come together to collect, wrap, package and deliver baskets for families with children in Keizer. Baskets often contain food, toys, clothes and other items depending on the interests of the child and the needs of the family.
Starting in November, over 20 participating organizations and businesses have had Christmas trees decorated with tags with wishes from children in the Keizer area. People take the tags, fill the requests and return the unwrapped gifts to any participating site no later than Wednesday, Dec. 10.
All request tags are confidential, only listing the age and gender of each child.
Volunteers will wrap the gifts Wednesday, Dec. 17, at Santa Central at Lakepoint Community Church, 2856 Broadway St. N., and deliver them to families on Saturday, Dec. 20.
This year’s project is organized by the Keizer Community Foundation, a nonprofit founded in 2004 which “provides cultural and educational opportunities, charitable services and personal development programs to Keizer citizens,” according to its website.
Since last year, the Keizer Elks Lodge has been in charge of gathering and packaging the food delivered to families alongside the gift baskets, said Jeremy Turner, president of the Keizer Chamber.
Every year, organizers work with staff at each school in the area to identify families who may benefit from the program and to know the interests of each child before collecting items for their basket, according to Jill Gust, the administrative assistant and event coordinator at the Keizer Chamber.
“We try to tailor it to each kid, and we put that on the tags that go out to the community,” Gust said.
The goal is to serve over 200 families.
Not including food sorting, volunteers worked a total of 449 hours combined in last year’s effort, Gust said. Around 45 people helped wrap gifts and up to 70 participated in delivering the baskets, according to Turner.
For information or to help, contact Gust at [email protected] or call the Chamber at 503-393-9111.
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