Longtime Holiday Partners volunteer shares joy at Christmas
Consuela Good has helped make many Christmases special for needy children as a volunteer with the United Way of York County’s Holiday Partners program.
“Why walk through your life, knowing you can help other people, and then you don’t?” said the Rock Hill woman, who has been a volunteer for the last nine years.
Holiday Partners is a collaboration between The Herald’s Empty Stocking Fund and WRHI’s Toys for Happiness that provides gifts for children across York County.
Donations of cash and toys for the program are needed quickly, said program coordinator Jeanie Dubrouillet. Volunteers start choosing and packing gifts for families this week, she said. The process continues through Dec. 17.
Holiday Partners helps families with children from birth to age 14.
The program is supported by cash donations from The Herald’s Empty Stocking Fund and new toys donated through WRHI. The program also gets donations from businesses and the community.
Good, 44, got involved with the program when she took her then-2-year-old son to see Santa. She saw a volunteer list and signed up.
Good said many children would receive nothing for Christmas without the program.
“We even have families who ask us if we give away Christmas trees and clothes,” she said. “These are working families that still need extra help.”
“They are only getting paid a certain amount of money, and they still need assistance,” she said. “If you make $7.50, eight dollars an hour, you can’t raise a family on that.”
Others are sick or have recently been laid off.
“Grandparents will come with their grandkids because they have custody, but they have no way of getting toys or presents for the children,” she said.
Good assists families through the application process and then helps pack toys for recipients. The best part, she said, is when families come to get their packages.
“When the recipients come to pick up their toys, they are so happy and so thankful and so excited, it’s all worth it in the end,” Good said.
“We like to see them come pick it up,” she said, “because they are happy, and they know that their kids will have something when they wake up on Christmas morning.”
Want to help?
▪ Donate to The Herald’s Empty Stocking Fund by mailing donations to or dropping them off at The Herald, 132 W. Main St., Rock Hill, S.C. 29730. Checks should be made to Empty Stocking Fund, c/o UWYC. For more information on how to contribute, call 803-329-4052.
▪ Donate to Toys For Happiness by dropping off new, unwrapped toys in collection boxes at locations around York County. Local sites include WRHI/Interstate 107 radio stations, 142 N. Confederate Ave., Rock Hill; and the United Way of York County, 226 Northpark Drive, Suite 100, Rock Hill. For information on how to get a donation box placed, call WRHI’s Corree Carelock at 803-324-1340.
This story was originally published December 5, 2015 at 5:46 PM with the headline "Longtime Holiday Partners volunteer shares joy at Christmas."