ORLANDO, Fla. — Leaders at One Heart for Women and Children say 20,000 people visit their campus for services each month, but not every person needs help for the holidays.

Of those who do, volunteers are making sure they have a stress-free Thanksgiving by giving out free baskets of food.

What You Need To Know

Staff and volunteers at One Heart for Women and Children assembled more than 1,500 Thanksgiving baskets

The free baskets will help hundreds of families put food on the table this holiday

The baskets are made up of boxed and canned foods, along with a protein such as turkey or ham

One Heart for Women and Children has a food assistance program for families and individuals in need

Founder Stephanie Bowman says the team packed 1,505 baskets. Some received meat — like ham or turkey — while others received a gift card to buy their choice of protein. Bowman says each basket feeds four to six people.

“The families we know needed some assistance with Thanksgiving, we made sure that they knew the date, the time, what they were going to receive to be able to pick it up,” said Bowman.

The baskets were helpful for people like Destiny Perez-Prado. She’s been visiting One Heart for Women and Children for three years and says she was affected by the government shutdown.

“I have seven kids and then I have two that I also care for, so without having access to our food stamps or a lot of other resources for food, it was really hard for me to stay afloat with feeding everybody,” said Perez-Prado.

Perez-Prado says without the One Heart team, she would really be struggling, but they instantly made her feel like family.

“The feeling she gives me in my heart is as if I do have a mom here,” she said. “Even though my mom’s in heaven, she sent me a guardian angel here in the form of Stephanie.”

Tonya Selby and her husband feel the same — they’ve been visiting the campus since 2009. The couple used to get food stamps, but it went away during the shutdown.

“That makes it quite difficult for families who work from check to check,” said Selby. “And it makes it a lot (more) difficult to figure out where you’re going to get your next meal from, where you’re going to get hygiene stuff from if you need it.”

Leaders say all of this year’s baskets have been claimed already, but they have a food assistance program. If you’re looking to give back, they’re accepting physical and financial donations too.

More information can be found on One Heart for Women and Children’s website or you can visit the campus at 2040 North Rio Grande Ave., Orlando, FL, 32804.