1st Quarter Newsletter

Brunswick Family Assistance

1st Quarter Updates

• CHRISTMAS IN JULY 

  • BFA’s annual Christmas in July program is designed to provide school-aged children in Brunswick County with not only a book bag with all of the requisite school supplies, but also a brand new outfit of clothing and a new pair of shoes. Often times, this is the only time that the children enrolled in this program have the opportunity to wear NEW clothing and shoes. We feel that offering children new clothing and shoes for the first day of school gives them the confidence that they need to walk into school with their heads held high. This helps them to focus not on their economic status but on their education.

The Christmas in July Program is an angel tree program and through the generosity of our community, last year 396 Brunswick County children started school with everything that they needed for a successful school year! THANK YOU to everyone that helped make this possible!

• Disaster Relief  

  • In the aftermath of hurricane Florence BFA was named the point of contact for donations and volunteer efforts county wide. In this role we were responsible for accepting all donated goods and organizing and scheduling volunteer efforts. The response that we saw from our community was AMAZING! People came from far and wide, both across the Country and right next door, to offer a helping hand and donate resources to help those affected by the storm. The chain of events look something like this:

    • September 14th Florence crashed into our coast and left massive, long-lasting devastation in her path.

    • September 18th– County officials asked BFA to be the primary point of contact for disaster relief efforts throughout the County

    • September 19th– People from all over the country started calling and coming to the BFA office offering their support. When tractor trailer loads of donations started arriving, we quickly realized we would need a place to store, sort and stage these donations for distribution. WE OWE A HUGE “THANK YOU” TO THE BRUNSWICK BEACON FOR OFFERING THEIR WAREHOUSE SPACE TO HELP WITH THE DISASTER RELIEF EFFORTS. If not for them, none of these efforts would have been possible! 

    • September 20th– BFA secured several points of distribution throughout the county, loaded the trucks and started getting supplies out to the community. Items distributed included food, water, toiletries, cleaning products, diapers and wipes, tarps, clothing, paper products and more.

    • Over the next several weeks we distributed supplies daily at 19 different mobile distribution sites, worked with other community partners and provided assistance to over 10,000 people affected by hurricane Florence.  We are so grateful to the MANY other community organizations and Churches that offered their space and support to make this possible. It truly was a community effort.

    • What’s next? – While we will continue to distribute supplies through our two emergency food pantries, we have begun to shift our focus to long-term recovery efforts such as rapid re-housing and home repairs. We will partner with other local organizations like Wilmington Area Rebuilding Ministries (WARM) and Brunswick Housing Opportunities (BHO) as well as our local government to fund essential home repair projects and other long-term needs to ensure that people in our community are able to return to safe, stable homes.

• BFA is so grateful to everyone in our community for the outpouring of support you have offered during this incredibly difficult time. Personally, I could not be more proud of BFA’s staff and volunteers. They all worked many long, hard hours, often neglecting their own recovery needs, to ensure our community remained BRUNSWICK COUNTY STRONG!! 

•  UPCOMING EVENTS: 

•  Our Commodities distribution will be on May 8th and 9th. This program provides food to many families that are experiencing food insecurity. If you would like to volunteer for this program please contact Charles Jackson (910-754-4766) or by email @ Charlesg.bfa@yahoo.com.