Hope for the Holidays

For 49 years Community Action Partnership of Orange County (CAPOC) has been serving thousands of local families affected by poverty. This holiday season, the non-profit is dedicated to making sure that children, families, and seniors impactedby poverty are not left behind by providing them with crucial necessities such as holiday meals, winter clothing, and toys for children.

“We are so thankful to our donors and volunteers who helped us serve more than 15,000 unique families last holiday,” said Clarence Ray, Executive Director of CAPOC. “Unfortunately, there are even more families that need our help this year and we need the support of our community now more than ever.”

In Orange County, the number of people living in poverty continues to grow. While many low-income families work, they do not have sufficient resources to meet basic needs due to low wages, high housing costs, rising food prices and other economic problems that are making it harder for our families to make ends meet.

CAPOC’s Hope for the Holidays campaign is set up so that individuals, companies, congregations, and civic groups can participate collectively, or on their own to make a difference in the lives of families throughout Orange County. How can you get involved:

1. Adopt-a-Family: Make a difference this holiday season by adopting a whole family affected by poverty. Gifts and special holiday meals become secondary when bills need to be paid. You can make the holiday season so much brighter by providing new clothes, toys and holiday food baskets to your family. All families are screened by CAPOC staff and have been verified as low-income.
2. Monetary Donation: Make your dollar go further. Our OC Food Bank is able to purchase food at wholesale prices and leverage other donations, making your gift go further. With a $20 donation, CAPOC can buy approximately $100 worth of food to give to our neighbors this holiday season.
3. Food Drives: Throw a food drive to provide holiday meals for at-risk families. You can also conduct a virtual food drive from our OC Food Bank Web site: www.ocfoodbank.org/virtual_drive. If you don’t have time to throw a drive, consider donating a gift certificate for a turkey or other holiday food that we can purchase for clients on your behalf.
4. Toy Drive or Gift Certificate Drive: Consider collecting toys for children this holiday season. CAPOC gives toys to children ages 0 to 18 but their greatest need is gifts for children ages 11-16. Gifts must be new and unwrapped. Gift certificates are also accepted to allow parents the opportunity to purchase gifts for their children themselves.

On Wednesday, November 5^th from 5:30-7:30, CAPOC is hosting a Hope for the Holiday’s Kickoff event at Anaheim Packing House (440 S. Anaheim Blvd., Anaheim, CA 92805). This event is free to the public to learn more about the ways in which you can get involved this holiday season. Please RSVP to events@capoc.org

If you are interested in more information on how you can help end hunger during this holiday season and feed Orange County’s low-income children, please visit www.capoc.org/h4h. Together, we can eliminate hunger and poverty in Orange County.

Posted by Rachel Allan

10/29/14