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August 2008 |
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Monday, 17 December 2007 |
Shop-with-a-Cop helps 80 area children in 13th year
By KRISTIN REICHARDT
Staff Writer
Jordan Foster scampered back to the toy aisle in search of an item he forgot as his grandmother and a member of the Auglaize County Sheriffs Office smiled at each other and waited near a cart filled with items for the young boy.
Camouflaged pants and jacket, denim jeans and a Yamaha Raptor 700 toy dirt bike lay among the items the 8-year-old from Wapakoneta chose during his shopping spree Saturday as part of the 13th annual Shop-with-a-Cop program.
“He’s into race stuff, like cars,” Janet Foster, Jordan’s grandmother, said. “If it wasn’t for these policemen, these kids wouldn’t be where they are. This is a God-send.”
Sponsored by the Auglaize County Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police, the Shop-with-a-Cop program helps families such as Jordan, his mother, Vickie Foster, and his 6-year-old sister, Jackie Foster, who may be going through a tough time financially, purchase clothes and toys for the children’s Christmas presents.
“It helps my kids out,” Vickie Foster said after her children checked out. “I don’t make enough money for my kids to get them the things they want.
“It helps me give them the Christmas I want to,” she said.
Each child received $100 to spend on clothes and $50 to spend on toys as they shopped with a member of an Auglaize County law enforcement agency, a high school student who kept a tally of their purchases, and an adult family member at the Wapakoneta Wal-Mart Supercenter on Bellefontaine Street.
“It went real well,” Shop-with-a-Cop Chair Jerry Sawmiller said Sunday in a telephone interview. “It has always gone well.”
This year’s event helped 80 children in 44 families. Approximately 40 law enforcement officers participated.
Sawmiller, who has been involved in the program since its inception and has been in charge for approximately eight years, said the program has grown in the level of community awareness and the number of children it helps.
“We get a lot more donations than when we first started,” Sawmiller said. “That tends to grow steadily every year.”
The first year supported approximately 20 children, and Sawmiller said he does not anticipate the number growing much past where it is now due to constraints such as the number of officers that can volunteer.
“It may increase a little more, but not a whole lot more,” Sawmiller said.
The event helps the officers involved just as it helps the families, he said.
“They are able to provide a really positive side of law enforcement that sometimes some of them don’t always necessarily see,” Sawmiller said of how interacting with law enforcement officials so closely helps the children.
Area high school students, former DARE students, the law enforcement officers’ families and members of other county governmental agencies also help with the program.
“They get a taste of maybe another life that they’re not even familiar with,” Sawmiller said. “At that young age, everything is kind of a shallow experience for them. This gives them a chance to see that there are other people in the world who really need other people’s assistance.”
Jeff Ruppert, a retired Auglaize County Sheriff’s Office deputy and the Fraternal Order of Police treasurer, said he brought his 21-year-old, 19-year-old and 15-year-old children to participate in shopping while they were in high school to give them that different perspective.
“It does open their eyes a lot,” Ruppert said.
As a parent, Shop-With-a-Cop touches him significantly every year as he and his fraternity brothers are able to help other parents at Christmas time.
“It is just really neat because a lot of the kids just don’t have the means, and they get really excited,” Ruppert said. “I had several officers who said the kids coming up at the end and giving them hugs was the best part. It is just priceless.”
The excitement begins for him when he is able to call families to tell them they were accepted out of the more than 80 applicants.
“I actually had two moms who started crying when I called and told them they were accepted,” Ruppert said. “They said, ‘You have no idea how much this means.’ ”
The event costs approximately $12,000 annually.
Tonya Rowell and her four children, accompanied by three Sheriff’s Office deputies went home with items from the movies “Spiderman” and “Cars,” as well as socks, shirts and other needed items.
“She wouldn’t have had anything for them otherwise,” Mana Pongracz, Tonya Rowell’s mother, said.
She said the couple’s 3-year-old is diagnosed with juvenile diabetes, and much of the family’s money goes for his medicine and care.
Rowell said in addition to meeting some of her children’s wants and needs, the Shop-With-a-Cop gives them a positive view of police officers.
“It helps them that they know that the cops are trying to help them,” Rowell said. “It teaches them that police are good people.”
Mostly, Rowell said she enjoyed seeing her children’s excitement over their new toys.
“It makes me feel good that they can get what they want,” Rowell said. “I really appreciate the help.” |
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 18 December 2007 )
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| | ...I love the "small town" charm and sense of community I feel when I run into my father at Community Market or my Mother-in-Law at Walmart or one of my sisters at the gas station! Tracy Anderson - Wapakoneta
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