Since the 1970’s, the Knox Kiwanis Club has helped those in need with Christmas food baskets and yesterday, members of the Knox National Honor Society and the Student Council, plus North Judson and Knox Kiwanis members, helped assemble those baskets at Community Services of Starke County.
The Energy Assistance Program for LaPorte, Pulaski, and Starke County residents is in full swing, as the North Central Community Action Agencies, Inc. and Community Services of Starke County have begun taking applications.
The WKVI/Five Star Food Drive was a great success. Joan Haugh, Director of Community Services of Starke County, called with the totals yesterday morning. Over $1,000 was collected in cash donations, and that includes $500 from Five Star.
Joan said that over 300 pounds of food was collected during the five hour food drive. She said that she’s appreciative of the help and that food will help feed families in Starke County for the holiday season.
The 2nd Annual WKVI/Five Star Food Drive was a success Saturday! Several carts of food were donated from patrons in the community who helped make the holidays a little better for those in need this season. Food and cash donations were accepted and totals will be announced next week. Thank you to all who contributed and Happy Thanksgiving! Continue reading
The 2nd Annual WKVI/Five Star Food Drive will be held Saturday, November 19th from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at Five Star in Knox.
We will be broadcasting live during that time and we will be accepting donations for the Community Services of Starke County Food Pantry. Five Star has some good deals this week so stop in the store and buy a couple of extra items and donate them to the food pantry. You may also make cash donations.
The Community Services of Starke County was recently chosen Agency of the Year.
The Food Bank of Northern Indiana recently presented a plaque to Community Services of Starke County Program Coordinator, Cecilia Torres-Bowman.
Community Services of Starke County Food Pantry currently serves over 250 families a month, a huge jump from serving 150 families in January of 2010. The pantry has matched the government commodities by 240% in 2011 and has been able to operate the food pantry through the generous donation of time and labor from volunteers.
The Second Annual WKVI Great Pumpkin Drop has filled the Community Services of Starke County Food Pantry, for now.
We asked Cecilia Torres-Bowman, Services Coordinator at the Starke County Food Pantry if she could use all of the food brought to the location.
George Mammarella from Economy Auto Sales in Knox presented Community Services of Starke County Executive Director, Joan Haugh, with a donation of $1,200 for the Food Bank. As part of Economy Auto’s September customer appreciation month, George and Della Mammarella pledged a $30 donation for each vehicle financed during the month. 40 vehicles qualified for the donation.
Starke United’s Board has approved the reallocation of funds to enable Community Services to provide the matching funds for 125 meals to the homebound elderly, matching funds for 133 hours of homemaker service to the elderly and disabled and for the preparation and printing of the Starke County Resource Directory. The Starke United Board also approved $1,500 for the food pantry in July after allocating $2,500 for the pantry in April.
Knox City Police officers are investigating a break-in at the Community Services of Starke County building in Knox.
Police say that some unknown subject(s) broke a window on the south side of the building and gained entry. The subject(s) then removed a 42 inch flat screen TV from the building and that was the only item reported stolen. No other damage was reported. Police were called to the scene Thursday morning at 7:20 a.m. but it is believed the incident happened late Wednesday evening or in the early morning hours on Thursday. Evidence was secured at the scene.
The Community Services of Starke County staff is gearing up for the winter season. Cooler weather is right around the corner and they will soon be taking applications for energy assistance to households that meet income guidelines.
Cecilia Torres, Services Coordinator at the Starke County Food Pantry is seeing some donations coming into the facility which helps the 220 families the pantry serves each month.
“We’ve had a lot of organizations, a lot of people making donations, especially of the fresh vegetables. We’re really appreciative of that,” said Torres.
Cecilia Torres, Services Coordinator at Community Services of Starke County, says the community has stepped up to the plate with donations to the Food Pantry.
Only three weeks ago, we were reporting that the Food Pantry had no food on the shelves and only one package of hot dogs was in the meat section.
Torres especially wanted to thank officials of the Starke County 4-H Fair Livestock Auction for directing bidders to the food pantry. A number of the winning bidders gave their purchases to the Food Pantry.
Cecilia said the bidders had turkeys, ducks and chickens dressed for distribution.
The Community Services of Starke County Food Pantry is in need of donations.
“Our shelves are just about bare, there’s nothing on them,” said Cecilia Torres, Services Coordinator. “More and more people are turning to the Food Pantry and donations are down. We receive no government subsidies at all except for commodities and we haven’t received those in almost three months. We get our food from churches, organizations, and individuals who open up their pocketbooks and their hearts to us. We’ve gotten a few dollar donations but we’ve been spending over $1,200 a month on meat alone. Right now I have a couple of packages of hot dogs and that’s it.”
The food pantry at Community Services of Starke County is getting dangerously low of products. Joan Haugh, the Executive Director of Community Services, said the need is even greater now than at this time in previous years.
Community Services of Starke County is announcing a fare increase for transportation beginning July 1st.
“The reason why we had to do an increase is because of the cost of gasoline,” said Director Joan Haugh. “We put this off and we’re not seeing a break. We’re already six months into this year and we’ve almost spent as much as we did last year. With that cost increasing, we felt that we had to do something so we are increasing as of July 1st. The people that we’ve already told are regular riders and they’ve been asking us for some time when we are going to be raising our rates. How can we afford not to? I think they understand but I just wanted to let the public know too that there is a slight increase.”
The annual Volunteer Fair is this Saturday, April 30th from 9:00 a.m. to Noon at the Knox High School. The Volunteer Fair is sponsored by the Community Services of Starke County, Northwest Indiana Action Corporation, United Way of Porter County and Healthlinc.
Do you know where you can volunteer in Starke County? Over fifteen agencies will be present with volunteer opportunities for persons of all ages.
The Community Services of Starke County Food Pantry is running low on food items and Cecilia Torres, Services Coordinator at Community Services of Starke County, says now is the time to donate.
“Right now, we’re in dire need of food,” said Torres. “We have been serving over 250 families a month. As fast as we get food on the shelves, it goes right back out. In addition to regular canned goods and non-perishables, we could also use money. It’s been about every week or so that we’ve been ordering meat and it’s really adding up. We do need any help that we could possibly get.”
The Senior Volunteer of the Year and the Older Hoosier of the Year award winners were announced Thursday during a luncheon at the Bass Lake Fire Department.
“Today, we are honoring all of our volunteers for the past two years, for 2009 and 2010,” said Community Services of Starke County Director, Joan Haugh. “This is just our opportunity to give them a little credit for all of the many hours of service they’ve put in or the donations they’ve given to support our programs and the food pantry. We’re very grateful for them and if anyone out there would like to volunteer, please call me.”
James Skibbe, the State of Indiana Eligibility Manager for the Starke County office of the Division of Family Resources, will present an upcoming program entitled “Understanding the Spenddown.”
Persons on Medicaid have a difficult time understanding the concept and reasoning behind the spenddown that is required before Medicaid funding can be used to meet physician or hospital expenses.
