Helping The Homeless On Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day is one week away. It's a special time when most families get together to celebrate and give thanks for everything they have in their lives. But there are some people in Norwalk who don't have much or anything at all. No home to entertain loved ones or even a family member to share a hug or a laugh with. Some don't even have enough money to buy a warm meal. That's where the comes in.

"We will have a marathon meal starting from noon to 7pm," said Frank Concepcion, manager of program operations. "People can come in and eat as many meals as they want. We expect to serve about 400 meals."

For those who don't come in, the will put together a Thanksgiving feast for the nearly 150 residents who applied for the special meal. With the help of local donors, families will have a turkey with all the trimmings to enjoy next Thursday. There is still plenty of time for anyone interested in donating food for the homeless, to do so.

"We had 1,451 requests for groceries last month," said Concepcion. "That is a record for us. The most we've ever had. It's been hard to keep the pantry filled. Food just flies off the shelf. If individuals, families, or restaurants and businesses want to help out, we'd definitely appreciate it."

The Open Door Shelter always gets a lot of volunteers to work in the kitchen during the Thanksgiving holiday and Concepcion finds himself turning many of them away because there just isn't enough work to do for everybody. However, he wants people to know the shelter is always looking for help during the year.

"They can come before Thanksgiving and after it," Concepcion said with a big smile on his face. "People are enthusiastic about working on Thursday, but we'd also love to have them on the days before and the days after it."

The shelter has experienced a stunning make-over in the last year with new floors, a coat of paint, and a career development center. But the most important thing to the shelter is food and a lot of it.

"The number of requests for groceries by families in the city has increased tremendously over the last several months. Times are definitely tough. Any way people or businesses can help out, that's be great. That's what we need."