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JAMESTOWN – A local nonprofit is keeping the community warm with clothes lines placed in different parts of the City of Jamestown.
The ‘Keeping Each Other Warm’ program is back in action for their eighth year of providing the community with a variety of cozy outerwear as winter sets in.
Founder and Executive Director Georgeanna Guiffrida-Ribbing tells us this all got started when she and her family decided to clean out their closets.
“I got so much stuff and I couldn’t put it all out and in one time, so we just decided to keep it going, and then interest grew, so we’re on our eighth year of doing it,” said Guiffrida-Ribbing
Without the community she says none of this would be possible.
“I have people that participated in donating to us since the beginning, that nit stuff all summer long, all year long, and just to donate to us when we start our collection in the late fall, early winter, so it’s it’s very heartwarming,” said Guiffrida-Ribbing.
While there have been some challenges along the way, the program has always managed to keep our community nice and toasty.
“It’s been kind of a learning curve, and doing things where I don’t put as much stuff out at once, as I used, to when I first started just, to be sure that things are being used in the way that we’re intending to used,” furthered Guiffrida-Ribbing. “I’m out probably every couple days I’m stacking items on the line through the winter.”
She says the values she and her family get from the experience is something to be shared.
“It’s a great activity to do with your family, doing it with my children for the past seven, going on eight years, it’s been just something that I can’t explain unless your doing it with your family,” Guiffrida-Ribbing furthered “It’s very heartwarming, and it teaches the gift of hope, and gift of giving, and how it’s so important to do that.”
Clothesline sites can be found at Keelboat Landing on the Riverwalk, outside the Reg on East Third Street, Lillian Dickson Park on Falconer Street, the Willard Street Tot Lot, and James Prendergast Library.
For more information about ‘Keeping Each Other Warm’ you visit their Facebook page at facebook.com/keepeachotherwarm.
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