Kenneth Brown
of The Clarion
More support is needed for an annual program that empowers children in six area communities by giving them a chance to buy Christmas gifts for their family members.
The Santa’s Hut program gives children 12 years of age and under a chance to attend shopping events in their communities and purchase gifts for parents and siblings at a nominal price. Items are priced from minimum of 25¢ for smaller items to a maximum of $6 for larger items.
Donations of new, unwrapped gift items and cash are being accepted for the Santa’s Hut program. There are drop-off locations in each of the six participating communities for people to donate the new, unwrapped gift items.
Misty Leismeister, president of the West Central Crisis and Family Support Centre in Kindersley, is a co-ordinator for the program., which is in its 25th year. She said donations of gift items and cash are down from other years. Shopping events are set to start this week.
Donations are still needed for this year’s Santa’s Hut.
“We’ve really got nothing so far this year,” she said. Donations are down in nearly every community where shopping events are held and support will be needed over the coming days. “We are low in every area.”
The first Santa’s Hut shopping event of the season takes place in Coleville this Friday. Shopping events in nearby communities are set for Coleville on Dec. 1 at Rossville School from 3:30 to 5 p.m.; in Marengo on Dec. 7 at Westcliffe Composite School from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; in Eatonia on Dec. 9 at the Community Hall from 2 to 5 p.m.; and in Kindersley on Dec. 16 at Elizabeth School from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Events also take place in Eston and Rosetown.
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The drop-off locations are at Rossville School in Coleville; Bredy’s Country Store and Eatonia United Church in Eatonia; and the Kindersley Mall administration office and crisis outreach centre in Kindersley. In Marengo, there are several locations, including the Alsask Post Office, JC’s Little Valley Store in Flaxcombe, Co-op store in Hoosier, and Westcliffe School and village office.
The program is always short on items for men and teenagers, but she said the program was short on items for all demographics as of the middle of last week. Leismeister works with local co-ordinators in each community and she said donations were down everywhere.
Tax receipts are available for people making donations of money or toys, but donations have to be made at the organization’s outreach centre on First Avenue West in Kindersley in order to get a tax receipt. People have to keep receipts from their gift purchases if they want a tax receipt.
People who make donations at the outreach centre for tax purposes must identify the communities they want their donations to support.
If people do not want a tax receipt for their cash donations, a donation could be made to the co-ordinators in their communities. The local co-ordinators in nearby communities include Leismeister and Doreen Gramlich in Kindersley, Jolene Scheible in Coleville, Anne Rhodes in Eatonia and Sara Wilke in Marengo.
Cash donations work just as well as donations of gift items because co-ordinators use the money to purchase items before the shopping events, Leismeister said. The money helps to fill gaps if they are short items for certain demographics.
She said no donation ever goes to waste. If items are not purchased at an event one year, they are rolled over to the next year or used to help fill gaps for subsequent events.
The co-ordinator said donations of new gift items would be accepted at drop-off locations until the day before each of the shopping events. She said any support is appreciated and the kindness goes a long way for the kids.
“It’s all about the kids,” Leismeister added. The program is well utilized by the children and although proceeds from the shopping events help to support the centre and its services, children benefit from the excitement of shopping for their families.
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