Toys for Tots Pasco - How You Can Help

Gearing up for Toys for Tots

by JANET WATSON, Staff Writer

WESLEY CHAPEL–Anna Fulk is getting ready for a second big Christmas for the needy children of Wesley Chapel. As captain of the Wesley Chapel distribution, Fulk is doing everything she can to gather toys and money for this year’s Toys for Tots campaign.
Fulk set up at the Wesley Chapel Sweetbay Supermarket in the Town Centre shopping plaza at Old Pasco Road and Wesley Chapel Boulevard on a recent Saturday, and with the help of the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office, collected toys as well as money that will be used to fix up old bikes that she has already been collecting for Toys for Tots children.

“So many of our kids do not have bikes,” Fulk says, and although she realizes that bikes are often on children’s Christmas lists, they are rarely donated to the cause. Fulk has partnered with a dealer at the Eagles Flea Market who will sell bike parts to her at half-price so that second-hand bikes in decent condition can be fixed up and provide a very special Christmas for some lucky boys and girls. Anyone who has a talent for bike repairs can get in touch with Anna at cfulk@tqampabay.rr.com..
Fulk is very grateful for the support of Sweetbay and the Sheriff’s Office deputies, as well as the local schools that have been registering children in need.

December 2 is the “Letter Carriers’ Toy Drive’ during which postal workers will pick up new unwrapped toys that are set out next to mailboxes. Dozens of volunteers, including the Zephyrhills Marine Corps League Detachment 1124 and Pasco County Fire-Rescue, also help collect toys from the various collection sites around town and then deliver them to the various distribution sites. On December 15, collected toys will be sorted at the Wesley Chapel distribution site at Wesley Chapel Elementary School on Wells Road.

“We can use all the help we can get, from 6-8 p.m. on that day,” Fulk says. Typically, students, Scouts, Chamber of Commerce members, Rotary clubs, and others pitch in to organize the donations. Then, on December 16, from 8 a.m.-1 p.m., registered families come to the school to shop for their children. Similar distributions will take place elsewhere in east and central Pasco County.
We are told that Santa seems pleased with all the plans, so the only thing that remains is for caring community members to join the fun and have a more meaningful holiday because of their efforts.