By: Bob Strohm
bstrohm@wbcowqel.com
WQEL’s Rubber Duck Derby paid off in dividends Friday afternoon as the Bucyrus Backpack Program was presented a check for the monies raised for the organization.
WQEL Sales Manager Kim Goyer was on hand at Bucyrus City Schools’ Lincoln Administrative Building Friday afternoon to present the $500 check to the Bucyrus Backpack Program’s Purchasing Agent and Treasurer Virginia Hammontree and Assistant Treasurer Carol Holter. Both Hammontree and Holter were thankful for the donation and the help it will provide the program.
Holter explains where the money will be used within the Backpack program.
“Food For the kids for the weekend, we averaged about 160 last year each week,” Holter said. “Virginia does the majority of the buying, but she buys all over Mansfield, Marion and Bucyrus. We search for the best prices and try to keep the prices down for each bag.”
“This $500 means 100 children get to eat for one weekend,” Hammontree added. “I look at it at bits at a time.”
The Bucyrus Backpack Buddies program will be in full swing in mid-September with volunteers packing the backpacks on Wednesday in an assembly line fashion for about an hour so that the backpacks can go home with the students registered in the program on Friday. The Backpack Buddies program seeks 12 volunteers weekly in order to help fill the backpacks.
“Kroger and Wal-Mart here in town have been wonderful working with us,” Hammontree said. “When they have something on sale, and I can order it, they have it there for me.”
The $500 check was made possible with the help of local businesses Morning Glory Bakery, U B Dazzeled, Cellular Central, M.B. Subculture, Seigneur Photography, True Value, Norton’s Flowers, and Furner’s Floor Coverings. WQEL sends a special thanks to corporate sponsors for the event the Michael Taylor Foundation and Ohio Mutual Insurance Group.