Homeless Empowerment Program<\/a>\u00a0(HEP) in Clearwater.<\/p>\nWhat You Need To Know<\/p>\n
Nolan Davis, a second-grader, initiated a donation drive for the homeless
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He collected over 100 pounds of food along with bedding and hygiene items
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The Homeless Empowerment Program welcomed this significant contribution<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t want people to feel left out, like they didn\u2019t matter,\u201d said Nolan, who delivered handwritten letters to his neighbors, asking for help with donations.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have noodles, I have rice, I have toothbrushes,\u201d said Nolan as he showed everything he collected, which included more than 100 pounds of pasta.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really special, and it fills my heart with so much love and I\u2019m really proud,\u201d said Nolan\u2019s mother, Jenn. \u201cI love that he cares and thinks about others.\u201d<\/p>\n
HEP relies on donations and welcomed this milestone delivery.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s one of the largest youth-led donation drives that we have received,\u201d Katerina Gerakios-Siren, Executive Vice President of Operations for HEP.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s significant, she says, because of the state of food insecurity.<\/p>\n
\u201cApproximately 49% of local households with children live in financial insecurity and food instability,\u201d said Gerakios-Siren. \u201cWe\u2019re in the North Greenwood area, which is one of the what\u2019s called food deserts in Pinellas County, so this contribution goes a long way.\u201d<\/p>\n
HEP reports that more than 65,000 meals were served on campus last year. Nolan and his family hope the donation makes an impact beyond the dining room.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe get to, in some small way, give a hug, just to show them that there are people that care,\u201d said Jenn.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope it makes them feel good about themselves,\u201d said Nolan.<\/p>\n
Nolan plans to coordinate more donation drives, and he\u2019s volunteering with HEP, spending time with veterans on campus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEARWATER, Fla. \u2014 A Pinellas County second-grader is helping in the fight against food insecurity. Nolan Davis turned…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[3076,1188,4369,1548,1192,1187,115,596,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,835],"class_list":["post-193079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-good-news","tag-app-homelessness","tag-food-insecurity-and-hunger","tag-good-news","tag-homelessness","tag-melissa-eichman","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}