By Samantha Swindler / Managing Editor
Though the baskets have gone out and the needy have been fed, the Corbin Lions Club has fundraised only half its goal for its Christmas baskets this year.
Mike Pawula, district governor of 28 Lions Clubs in the area, said more than 350 people were served by the basket program, which provides food baskets Christmas Eve morning for needy families.
“Our goal is $20,000 to raise to help feed the needy in this area,” he said. “We just went over the $10,000 mark Monday night, so we’re just over halfway there.”
The Corbin Lions Club started the Christmas basket program more than 60 years ago, with three baskets of food. Back then, Pawula said, club members gave out live chickens with the meals.
They eventually moved to turkeys, but families didn’t have time to thaw and cook them for Christmas dinner. Today, they give out canned hams.
In addition, the baskets include essentials for a Christmas feast — milk, bread, fresh and canned vegetables, margarine, stuffing, flour, corn meal, cranberry sauce and cooking oil, among other items.
They also gave out children’s books collected during Corbin High School’s Storybook Christmas fundraiser.
More than 100 volunteers who distributed the baskets met at David’s Steakhouse at 6 a.m. Thursday for a free breakfast before heading to the vocational school behind Corbin High School to start delivering the baskets.
“It will make your Christmas because there is a true meaning when they say you get a better feeling for giving than receiving,” Pawula said of the basket deliveries. “Once you do it, it gets in your blood and when you see that there’s nothing in the house and you deliver food to them, it’s wonderful.”
In the 22 years Pawula’s delivered baskets, he said he’s seen heartbreaking stories — homes with dirt floors, where a coal bucket was the only source of heat, and where chickens slept in the living room with the children so they didn’t freeze outside.
Volunteers drove across Corbin and surrounding communities of Gray, Keavy and Rockholds to deliver the baskets Thursday.
“When you get off the beaten path, you won’t believe the need,” Pawula said.
The Lions Club also works with other churches and organizations that supply food baskets to make sure some aren’t doubly served while others go without completely.
The food to feed all 350 families was ordered early, and more donations are needed to cover the deficit the Lions Club had spent.
“All we need now is some more businesses and individuals to help us pay for this,” Pawula said.
Donations for the Christmas baskets can be mailed to Corbin Lions Club, PO Box 365, Corbin, KY, 40702.
“Anything would be appreciated,” Pawula said. “The $500 checks are great but the $5 checks are just as important because it all adds up.
“We are the hub of this. And everybody that donates is the spokes, and that is what makes this wheel roll. The community support is what makes this happen,” he added.
