How do you begin to thank the hundreds of individuals and businesses who stepped forward to help stock the shelves of Orofino\u2019s three local food banks? This past Friday and Saturday, KLER Radio hosted the 15th annual Stuff the Bus\u2014a project created to support local residents facing food insecurity during the holiday season.<\/p>\n
With the help of School District 171 volunteer bus drivers, Orofino High School Rotary Interact students, and a remarkably generous community, more than 8,920 pounds of food and essential products were collected in just two days.<\/p>\n
Sponsor locations LCCU and P1FCU Credit Unions, Watson\u2019s Market, and Barney\u2019s Harvest Foods served as remote broadcast sites, while the 64-passenger bus filled steadily with food and cash donations.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s amazing how listeners would pull up next to our bus, walk into LCCU or P1FCU, and come back out with donations\u2014from $5 to $150,\u201d said KLER General Manager Jeff Jones. \u201cHow can you ever say thank you enough?\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition, LCCU Branch, Manager Malia Earlywine announced a generous $1,000 donation to Lifeline Food Bank to help ahead of Thanksgiving. All four broadcast sponsors made significant contributions, joined by organizations such as Orofino Celebrations Lumberjack Days, which purchased 2,100 pounds of frozen turkeys to help \u201cStuff the Bus.\u201d<\/p>\n
The generosity continued when Jaynae Jones of the Orofino Farmers Market arrived with a donation. \u201cWe had extra funds at the end of our season, and we wanted them to go to a worthy cause. This was just that cause,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Rotary Interact students also took on a special assignment\u2014shopping at sponsor grocery stores for Thanksgiving items they would want on their own tables. Their efforts offered the community a glimpse of the strong, thoughtful leadership growing among Orofino\u2019s youth. Families brought their children to the bus to donate cash or bags of groceries, further demonstrating the heart of the community.<\/p>\n
At the end of the two-day drive, the bus was unloaded at St. Theresa\u2019s Catholic Church Food Pantry, Lifeline Food Bank, and the Seventh-day Adventist Church Orofino Food Bank.<\/p>\n
KLER extends its deepest gratitude to the volunteers who make this project possible each year\u2014people like Peggy Polito of St. Theresa\u2019s Food Bank, members of the Orofino High Interact Club, and Orofino Celebrations President Kelly Schmittou, who helped load all 35 cases of turkeys.<\/p>\n
Most of all, this event would not be possible without the unwavering generosity of the Orofino community. Thank you for making this the largest food drive in our history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"How do you begin to thank the hundreds of individuals and businesses who stepped forward to help stock…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":301796,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,451,3,452,453],"class_list":{"0":"post-301795","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}