Salvation Army fills the need during tough times

The Salvation Army is one of these agencies. It provides emergency aid in the form of clothing, food, medicine, utility assistance, shelter and transportation. Service center and thrift store are located at 450 Gault Avenue North (across from Union Park).

Director Michelle Gulledge said they will once again have the familiar kettles at Bruces and Walmart soliciting donations for their programs, which include a food pantry, shoe voucher program through Head Start and food pantry.

The Salvation Army was first organized and opened in 1863, Gulledge said.

The non-profit DeKalb County Service Center opened in 2007. It provides emergency disaster response to local incidents such as storm recovery.

"In our food pantry we work in cooperation with the Department of Human Services," Gulledge said. "Our clients apply for food stamps and the Department of Human Resources gives them a voucher to come to us and we provide food to them once a week until they receive their food stamps. We also have food out throughout the week for anyone to get. We are committed to helping break the cycle of food insecurities."

The Salvation Army also does energy assistance when funds are available.

"We assist fire victims with items of need from our family store. The shoe voucher program helps school-aged children in need of shoes. We work with the school systems to identify those n need of our shoe vouchers.

"We have personal comfort items that we assist with when the need arises in our community. It consists of toothpaste, toothbrush, deodorant, shampoo, etc. We can provide some help with medical orders as well when the funds are available," she said.

Their Angel Tree program helps children that would otherwise not have Christmas. They start taking applications after the Toys for Tots deadline for those who missed that deadline. They have a tree in the Family Store and place the angels on the tree or adoption.

"More families than ever are having to make hard choices this holiday season," Gulledge said.

"We will continue to help with the generous support and contributions and donations throughout the year from DeKalb County residents. We appreciate our donors an volunteers and could not survive without them.

For more information call, (256) 997-0858.

The UGF plans to hold a finale luncheon today (Nov. 30) at noon at First Presbyterian Church in Fort Payne. Executive Director Elizabeth McElrath said there will be door prizes and recognition bestowed.

Funds are raised during the fall and distributed to our agencies throughout the year. All of the money raised stays in DeKalb County and donations are tax deductible. UGF DeKalb is not affiliated with United Way.