Community Briefs

The Douglas-Elbert Task Force has organized Santa’s Sharing, a program in which individuals, groups and businesses in the community sponsor client families or seniors living alone for Christmas.

Interested parties may participate by sponsoring a task force family. Sponsors shop for new gifts from the family wish list, then wrap and deliver the gifts to the family before Christmas. A Christmas sponsorship generally costs about $50-$60 per family member.

Those who want to help but don’t have time for shopping can purchase one gift certificate for the amount they would have spent on gifts. This allows the parents to purchase and wrap the gifts for their family.

Community members also can help by buying new toys, games or books for the Task Force Toy Chest.

Each year, there are families not matched with sponsors. Volunteers select and wrap gifts for the children from the Toy Chest, and parents are provided with gift cards.

The task force also needs financial contributions and gift cards. These contributions are used to provide for those with special or emergency needs, teens of families not sponsored or families especially in need of food.

To get involved in helping a local family, call the Holiday Sponsorship Hotline at 303-382-3869 and leave a message with your contact information. A Santa’s Sharing volunteer will return the call. E-mail questions to Nani1674@aol.com with the subject line: Santa.

More than 45 Elbert County 4-H members attended the Dare To Be You camp in mid-November at the Colorado State Fairgrounds in Pueblo.

“It was a tremendous amount of youth representing Elbert County at the camp,” said Sheila Kelley, Elbert County 4-H Extension Agent.

Dare To Be You is an annual camp for 4-H members ages 11-13. It is sponsored by the South Central District, which include more than 16 counties.

Along with the 41 4-H members who attended, seven older members acted as camp counselors. These counselors provided leadership, presented the workshops and generally helped the younger members wherever needed.

Giving back to the community is a large part of 4-H. Attendees participated in four community service projects as well as the workshops. The community service projects consisted of constructing table placemats for senior citizens homes and Meals on Wheels recipients, designing bookmarks with “warm, fuzzy” messages for people that are suffering from a chronic illness and making greeting cards for U.S. troops.

The group also collected more than 12 boxes of non-perishable food to donate to food banks. Elbert County members collected the largest number of items. The food was split between Pueblo and Elbert County food banks.

Anyone interested in joining 4-H should call either Elbert County Extension Office at 303-621-3162 or 719-541-2361. Elbert County 4-H is a part of Colorado 4-H through Colorado State University.