While many were taking a much-needed break during the month of December, the Southeast Produce Council elves were busy making sure that those in need had a merrier Christmas through its SEPC Cares initiative.
During the first week of December, SEPC members enjoyed an evening of delicious food, rewarding fellowship and wholesome fun at the Paul Anderson Youth Home's Christmas Dinner Theater. The performance featured an original production highlighting the young men currently within the PAYH ministry program. As sponsors of the charity fundraising event as well as other Paul Anderson Youth Home activities, it was such a rewarding experience to see how God has been working in the lives of those young men, noted a Jan. 11 SEPC news release.
Over that next weekend, a few SEPC members along with their friends and families volunteered at the Atlanta-area Samaritan's Purse Operation Christmas Child Processing Center, where they packed shoeboxes for distribution to needy children around the world. Upon arrival, they unloaded several boxes they'd collected from their own communities to join the thousands of boxes to be processed and shipped that day. What a blessing to be able to join in such an amazing mission!
During the next few weeks, the SEPC also answered the call for help from their fellow non-profit partner Society of St. Andrew, which incurred extra freight and packing costs for almost a million pounds of produce sent to the Florida panhandle for hurricane relief.
Barbara Sayles, director of the Society of St. Andrew/Florida Region, expressed her sincere gratitude by saying, "Thank you so much. This will be so helpful. One hundred percent will be used for freight and packing costs we are incurring on the extra produce loads for hurricane damaged areas in the panhandle of Florida, which of course was not in our budget. We have already sent five loads of citrus (donated by Wonderful Citrus) and two loads of squash, green beans and sweet potatoes into that area, and are currently harvesting three Satsuma groves in Jackson County that will disburse about another half-million pounds of citrus into the hard-hit areas. Ten-thousand dollars will go a long way toward these expenses, mostly bags, boxes and freight. Again, thank you, we greatly appreciate this generous contribution as we try to help meet basic needs of those families who did not expect to be food insecure this year."
SEPC Vice Chairman Brandon Parker of Shuman Produce said, "The passion of the SEPC members is what makes this council so special. Our members are always eager to give back to the communities in which they live and where their products are sold. This is very evident by the events that have taken place over the month of December. May God receive all the glory for the faithfulness of this council."
