Every child in foster care in Clallam and Jefferson counties will get a measure of Christmas cheer, thanks to an outpouring of money and gifts to the Happy Holidays program of the state Department of Social and Health Services.
Colleen Robinson, director of the effort at the DSHS Port Angeles office, said about 300 children found sponsors — the first time every child has been sponsored in the three years she has coordinated the program.
The youngsters include 13 children who have been removed from their homes in the past week, she said.
On Tuesday, cadets of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps at Port Angeles High School were helping hand out the gifts.
“We”re in the throes of the foster families coming in to pick them up and distribute them,” Robinson said.
Happy throes they were, she added.
Outpouring of help
“We’ve had such an outpouring and such a response at such a time of need around the world,” she said of the many charities tugging at donors’ hearts and pockets this season.
Besides the 4,000-plus toys and apparel items donated through such projects as “giving trees,” a radiothon on Port Angeles station KONP-AM raised $2,000, Robinson said.
What isn’t spent at Christmas will provide future gifts such as senior pictures, prom dresses and birthday presents for children in foster care.
Robinson said publicity about the Happy Holidays program and the need for foster homes prompted nine people to express interest in becoming foster parents.
She hopes to recruit 24 foster families in 2006.