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Ground / Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
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Dab
Cast Member
Posts: 536
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 12-22-02 06:04 PM
Since you work in a place that may be aware, do you know if anyone is collecting for used coats, pants, shirts around here?
I did not see anything on tv this year about donating used coats and my son just cleaned his closet and dresser.
Killed me to see about 5 pairs of Levi's that were worn once! Anyway, I have about 5 ski type coats, ski pants and some longjohn shirts among other winter stuff, pants, shirts that I wanted to donate to a shelter or church but the churches around my area don't do that. Let me know if you know of someplace here or in the city.
Thanks
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Francine
Super Moderator
Posts: 1309
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 12-22-02 09:09 PM
Did you check with your local Red Cross? I know in our area they will take donations of that type. Another place to check is with your local Churches, and homeless shelters.
Francine
Come and visit my other home on the internet Our Laughing Place
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Dab
Cast Member
Posts: 536
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 12-22-02 11:00 PM
quote:
Francine wrote:
Did you check with your local Red Cross? I know in our area they will take donations of that type. Another place to check is with your local Churches, and homeless shelters.
Francine
No I haven't but thanks! The Red Cross was sort of snippy about donations a few years ago after a tornado. Without looking in bags of the people in front of us they told them "we are only taking new stuff right now". This was after the F5 and it may have been because they had gotten a lot of donations but the attitude of the person just really didn't sit well with me. They were rude about it to the person in front of me. I was hoping she knew of churches or schools in the area that were having clothes drives or similar.
[Edited by Dab]
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Tink *~*~*
Cast Member
Posts: 1066
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 12-23-02 12:49 AM
Dab, there is always the Salvation Army, they like gently used clothing. Also, around here we have PAL drop-boxes (Police Athletic League) and also St. Francis drop boxes in some church parking lots. Look in your phone book under charities - there are some places that will even swing by and pick up the stuff from you.
Tink *~*~*
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Dab
Cast Member
Posts: 536
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 12-24-02 02:41 PM
quote:
Tink *~*~* wrote:
Dab, there is always the Salvation Army, they like gently used clothing. Also, around here we have PAL drop-boxes (Police Athletic League) and also St. Francis drop boxes in some church parking lots. Look in your phone book under charities - there are some places that will even swing by and pick up the stuff from you.
It's wierd, I have seen nothing around here. Usually I do but I did think of something and I'm going to call on Friday. I'm going to get in touch with family services on the base as they have a clothes closet for the E-5's and below. Thanks for everyone's help. I just hate to toss these coats out as they are pretty good and those darned Levi's that are almost brand new kill me that he didn't wear them more.
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samogram
Cast Member
Posts: 166
Registered: Aug 2002
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Posted 01-05-03 03:56 PM
quote:
Dab wrote:
Since you work in a place that may be aware, do you know if anyone is collecting for used coats, pants, shirts around here?
I did not see anything on tv this year about donating used coats and my son just cleaned his closet and dresser.
Killed me to see about 5 pairs of Levi's that were worn once! Anyway, I have about 5 ski type coats, ski pants and some longjohn shirts among other winter stuff, pants, shirts that I wanted to donate to a shelter or church but the churches around my area don't do that. Let me know if you know of someplace here or in the city.
Thanks
Sorry to have just finally been to Common Ground for the first time since before Christmas. I wasn't ignoring you, Dab; sorry, sorry, sorry.... It must have felt like I was being rude.
Long story short: I've had several infections at one point I couldn't breathe and my kids moved far away (okay, only three hours away, but it feels "far" to me) two days before Christmas. It was the messiest Christmas I've ever had. But, quoting my favorite movie, "Parenthood," Life is messy.
You have probably found a place for your gently used items by now, but it's a good question and I wanted to explain the position of a lot of social service agencies on the issue for future reference. WARNING! This may be a long post!
The Women's Resource Center often needs clothing, especially, coats, for women and kids. We almost always need clothing for infants and small children, for larger size women, pregnant women and older boys. But the problem we have is this: we have no place to store things and fire inspectors have started taking notice of large piles of used clothing. We were once cited for that in an annual inspection. So, unless you have exactly the thing we need the very minute we need it, we may not be able to use it. We try very, very hard not to get "snippy" with people because we appreciate and need people's generosity. We're always happy people are thinking of us. So, we try to stay informed and let people know of other places they might take things.
One of my favorite places for my used things is the local vo-tech. They have people getting all kinds of training who will be needing to go on job interviews and don't have nice things to wear. Since the vo-tech is so generous to the women we serve, I feel like when they might need the things they will be able to get them out there anyway and so it's a referral I can feel good about. Some vo-techs even set up little "boutiques" with the things that are donated so that they can learn retail skills, displays, marketing and other related skills.
I don't know where all of our old clothes are coming from. When I used to work at the shelter, I swore they were breeding and multiplying in the night. Fortunately, the wire hangers were likewise engaged, so we could at least hang things. We would get a list of say, three churches who had clothes closets and start referring people to them. It would only take 3 or 4 weeks before they would call us and say, "Please stop referring people. We can't keep up and we've run out of room.
A secret between you and me.... I always seem to take
things from little old ladies and little old men and
little kids who gather up all their old toys for the
kids at the shelter. I just can't turn them down,
so Dab, you could sneak up to my place in a little
disguise and ask for me and you'd be set!
I've noticed on some Disney sites that people save their WDW toiletries for battered women's shelters. I thought I was the cleverest kid on the block when I started suggesting that people bring us their extra travel toiletries. My staff had to figure out a way to tell me that the women didn't like those little sizes. I still can't figure out why. It seems perfect to me. I also wouldn't take the eccentricities of a battered women's shelter in Norman, Oklahoma for the truth everywhere. I'll bet there are some shelters out there who love those.
Another couple of ideas for used clothing is to call your United Way and see if they know of some place that needs things. As I alluded to before, we share what we get with other agencies who need it. The Red Cross for example, acts like we've given them pure gold when we give them the travel toiletries. And there is a family out south and east of Norman in the country that collects things all year for people who get burnt out. They can use everything and must have a warehouse to store it all.
I also want to put add a little information item about used cell phones. Our cell phone program is called Women's Resource Center Cells and we take any and all used cell phones as do most battered women's shelters. We take even the old old old kind. We have found a place that distributes the old ones to countries outside the US who need them and turns around and pays us a small amount per phone which we then turn around to use in our programming.
Sincere apologies about not answering sooner. Hope all is well with you and thanks for thinking of those who need things we don't need anymore.
Samogram (Jo Ann)
Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons; for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.
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Common
Ground / Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
/ ? for Samogram |
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