If you truly care about this community and the less fortunate among us, of whom there are so many, you have three days to demonstrate it beginning today.
United Way of Robeson County’s Days of Caring — formerly the Day of Caring, when it was a one-day event — will be held Friday and Saturday during which there will be multiple opportunities to help your neighbors, and also to engage in some fun activities, enjoy good food, and perhaps make some new friends.
But as a prelude to that event, The Robesonian newspaper today will be collecting canned goods that will be provided to the United Way, which in turn will get them to area agencies that will make sure they reach needy families. Among the beneficiaries will be area soup kitchens, which do such wonderful work feeding the hungry and homeless.
We are asking folks to drop the goods off between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. at our office, which is located at 2175 Roberts Ave. There will be a tent in our parking lot that is on the west side of the building, and we ask that they are deposited there. There will be staff members from The Robesonian there to greet people and collect the goods.
If you want to park and take a quick tour of our new building, we invite that as well.
Day One of the event will be held on Friday at Lumberton Chevrolet, GMC, Buick, Cadillac’s Drive for Good from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. The address is 500 Linkhaw Road, which is across from Lumberton High School.
If you can’t make it to our office today to donate canned goods, this will be a second opportunity as there will be a collection site at the dealership.
Volunteers are still welcomed to participate. They will be dispatched to sites around the county for various projects from 9 a.m. to noon. They can return to the dealership at noon for some food to replace the spent calories and some fellowship.
If Friday doesn’t fit your calendar, then perhaps Saturday will, when Day Two will be held at Biggs Park Mall from 8:30 a.m to 2 p.m. The goal of Family Volunteer Day is to have families take part in service activities around the community while learning about important resources that are available. Participants will volunteer at various sites around the community from 9:30 a.m. to noon.
Afterward they are invited to return to the mall for a Block Party that will feature activities such as Partnership for Children’s KidsZone, face painting, rescue vehicles, health screenings in the Wellness On Wheels bus, and agency tables with games.
Lunch will be served by Kiwanis of Robeson-Lumberton, and there will be a drawing, with the lucky family winning tickets to Disney World.
The events, as we have indicated, depend on the willingness of people to volunteer. The need is so great, there can’t be enough of them, but if you plan to do so, the United Way asks you to RSVP by visiting www.UnitedWayRobeson.org. More information can be obtained by calling Jordyn Roark, an organizer, at 910-739-4249.
If you can’t volunteer on Friday or Saturday, we hope you can help out by dropping by our office today and donating some canned goods. Of course, you could do that as well as volunteer either Friday or Saturday.
We hope to see you today.