Toys For Tots Ready To Spread Joy

By Bob Loring

Published: Dec 1, 2006

I just got off the phone with Santa. He wants to know our plans for the upcoming holiday season. I told him, and now I'm telling you, that our Toys for Tots goal is to provide a "holly-jolly Christmas" for a record number of fully registered tots.

Our toy drop boxes are already in place throughout east and central Pasco County. For a listing of our many convenient drop-box locations near you, please visit our Web site: www.toysfortotspasco.org. Again this year, our friends and partners from Pasco Fire Rescue will help collect donated toys.

On Saturday, the U.S. Postal Service Letter Carriers Toy Drive will once again pick up new, unwrapped toys that we urge you to place next to your mailboxes. This easy method of collecting toys allows our program to expand each year. We will count upon this drive and your support to meet our ambitious target - serving 3,500 deserving tots.

Our Pasco County school district counselors will register needy children in each east and central Pasco school. Children not enrolled in school will be registered by Premier Community HealthCare Group. Fine partnerships have developed, and this fantastic arrangement ensures that our program serves the most deserving children in Pasco.

Parties will help generate a vast supply of additional toys and other necessary items for these children. Phillips & Jordan and Pasco Veterinary Medical will again host parties for our kids. And new this year, on Saturday, The Smokehouse Creek Rodeo Arena will host a Toys for Tots toy drive. Our outstanding relationship with local Rotary Clubs and the South Fork RV Park helps ensure that we will provide new socks, underwear and toothbrushes to many of the precious children we serve.

On Dec. 15, a swarm of our Pasco volunteers and young folks will assist us in sorting collected toys at all five distribution sites. Then, on Dec. 16 all of our registered families will assemble to receive toys, food and other necessary items for their children.

I told Santa, and now I'm telling you, that the guys of our Zephyrhills Marine Corps League, Detachment 1124, will keep a toy distribution site open the following week for any deserving family that we may have inadvertently missed.

Santa seems pleased with our plans. He blurted out a jolly "ho! ho! ho!" Now the only thing left is for our caring Pasco neighbors, friends and volunteers to give from the bottom of their generous hearts.

With our plan in place, I know our community will once again rise up to provide toys and other necessary items for these precious children. I'm sure that, together, we can again create the magic of the holiday season. And then Santa's head elf (that's me) will surely enjoy his tangy figgy pudding and a most merry Christmas.

God bless everyone!

The writer is lead Toys for Tots organizer for east Pasco County.

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