Ken and Ellen enjoyed a very white Christmas in New England.
SBCO Adopt a Family/Child for the holidays 2016
Ken and Ellen Perkins
We wanted to provide everyone an update on the Adopt a Child and Adopt a Family programs. We just returned from the snow and cold of New England where we spent the holidays with our family and especially our three grandchildren. There was a lot of sledding, tobogganing, skating and ski lessons for the two older grandkids. It was a lot of fun but we are happy to be back enjoying the warm weather activities in SaddleBrooke.
This year the deliveries were spread over two weeks because the winter vacation for the Oracle and San Carlos elementary schools started a week later than the Mammoth and San Manuel elementary schools. So we spent almost two weeks delivering gifts. We borrowed the SaddleBrooke Community Outreach (SBCO) Kids’ Closet van on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday to deliver to the San Manuel and Mammoth elementary schools. The next Monday we again used the Kids’ Closet van to deliver to Oracle’s Mountain Vista Elementary School. The next day we borrowed IMPACT of Southern Arizona’s truck to deliver to San Carlos. Our truckers drove about 400 miles to get the gifts to where they could be delivered to the needy families and Indian children. We work closely with Tribal Social Services as well as school counselors, principals and superintendents to ensure that we are serving truly needy children and families. Many thanks are due to all the shoppers, wrappers, truckers and loaders who contributed their time and energy to buy and wrap the gifts and get them all delivered on time. We especially want to thank the unit and group coordinators who are the heart and soul of this operation. Without their dedication, the Adopt a Child and Adopt a Family programs could never work. They keep everyone on schedule (including us) so that the gifts can be bought, wrapped and delivered on time.
This year donations leveled off a bit but still we almost matched last year’s peak. The program donors provided gifts for 95 families in Oracle, Mammoth and San Manuel as well as 223 Apache children on the San Carlos Reservation. Two of the units had money left over and bought diapers, sleepers, socks, hats and gloves for the San Carlos Young Mothers Program.
As a reminder for the coming year: SBCO is a 501 (c) (3) not for profit organization. Contributions to SBCO, a qualifying charitable organization, are also eligible for the Arizona Tax Credit for contributions to Charities that Provide Assistance to the Working Poor. As always, if you have questions, please contact your tax advisor.
We want to express our sincere thanks for the outpouring support we received for this worthy program. We look forward to working with you all again next fall. We received thank you notes on our return from New England from 19 families we served.
We wish you all a happy, healthy and peaceful new year!