Remembering those in need
Published 3:32 pm Wednesday, November 23, 2011
The holiday-shopping horn has sounded, launching what retailers hope will be a decidedly prosperous season at the cash register. The economy could certainly use a consumer-driven boost.
Which should remind us all of our neighbors who, because of a job loss, pay cut, home foreclosure or other financial calamity, will largely go without.
Food banks in Snohomish County are seeing lots of first-time users, Herald Writer Julie Muhlstein reported recently. Many, no doubt, were donors in past years.
Families that have been hanging on by living on savings or unemployment benefits have run out of options. Requests for assistance with housing and energy bills are way up, local service providers say.
Compounding the problem, the same recessionary forces are at play in federal, state and local budgets. That means grants and other funding for charities is down.
“With the decrease in federal and state funds, we’re relying even more on donations,” Leann Geiger, director of food bank services at Volunteers of America Western Washington, told Muhlstein.
Indeed, the Ways to Give list published annually by The Herald (heraldnet.com/waystogive) seems to carry a greater sense of urgency this year. Four years after the start of the Great Recession, unemployment remains stubbornly high. Even news that the jobless rate in Snohomish County fell from 9 percent to 8.7 percent last month wasn’t truly good. The drop was due to a smaller number of people seeking work, suggesting more have become so discouraged by the lack of prospects that they’ve stopped looking.
The Snohomish County Human Services Department reports that last year, nearly 70,000 people were living at or below the federal poverty level. That’s more than the entire population of Marysville, the county’s second-largest city. It’s doubtful that number has shrunk in 2011.
So as we charge en masse to the malls and shopping websites, we should make a point of setting aside something for our neighbors in need.
Donate to a food drive, or to several. Drop some change into the pots manned by the bell ringers at store entrances. Consult the list of charities on our Ways to Give list, which is packed with ideas for making this Christmas merrier for families and individuals facing bleak times.
Giving is, after all, the truest spirit of the season.
