One person. One vision. One county united.
As with most missions of the heart, this one starts with a vision.
This is the vision of one nurse at Regional Medical Center in Delaware County. Through her work in healthcare, Mindi Jackson began to see the needs of her and her colleagues’ at-risk patients emerge as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. She also saw the shortage of supply of much needed face masks in the health care environments across Delaware County. When volunteering to help at the school to help distribute free meals when the school system closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, she began to see depth of need to provide nourishment for families. In one week alone, West Delaware School system gave out 3,400 meals. Shortages of everyday items like lunch bags were now at an all time high.
Mindi created the Delaware County Pay It Forward COVID19 – 2020 Facebook page and her vision to holistically "fill in the gaps" in resources became a reality. She began to request sewers for face masks, groceries, paper products, and hand sanitizer for those identified in need through healthcare providers and Parents as Teachers. She contacted local pharmacies and restaurants that could order lunch size bags from their industries for the WD school system so that they could continue providing free meals. These are only a few of the stories of needs now being met because of her vision.
As we see time and time again in our communities, the response to help was overwhelming so she partnered with First Lutheran Church of Manchester to set up a Pay It Forward task force and inventory/distribution center.
As the needs continue to grow and change weekly, so will the efforts of this and other organizations providing resources to those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. From this vision, to “fill in the gaps” of resources available to at-risk members of our communities, the Foundation for the Future of Delaware County (FFDC) fully supported the creation of the FFDC COVID-19 Relief Fund. Please consider a donation to help support these efforts in Delaware County.
