Columbia-Adair County Generosity Honored by Operation Christmas Child

Adair County Judge/Executive Ann Melton and Columbia Mayor Mark Harris, center,
receive the inaugural Bruce Kramp Faithful Servants Award.

COLUMBIA, Ky. -- The generosity of Columbia-Adair County citizens was recognized Monday, March 4, at a special ceremony at Lindsey Wilson College. Volunteer leaders from Operation Christmas Child presented the county with the inaugural Bruce Kramp Faithful Servants Award.

Adair County received the award because the county's residents increased their OCC collections by 79 percent. In 2011, the county's residents donated 979 shoeboxes filled with items for children in developing countries. In 2012, the county's residents donated 1,759 shoeboxes, the biggest increase in Operation Christmas Child's nine-county Danville, Ky., Area.

In total, residents of Adair, Boyle, Casey, Garrard, Lincoln, Marion, Mercer, Taylor and Washington counties donated more than 23,000 shoeboxes in 2012 to OCC.

Operation Christmas Child is a grassroots organization coordinated by Samaritan's Purse, a nondenominational evangelical Christian organization that provides spiritual and physical aid to people around the world. Since 1970, Samaritan's Purse has helped worked with victims of war, poverty, natural disasters, disease and famine. The shoeboxes collected in Adair County in 2012 were distributed to children in Sub-Saharan African nations.

About 90 percent of shoeboxes are distributed in January-March, according to OCC Danville Area Coordinator Kathy Kendrick.

"Christmas comes with the boxes -- whenever the boxes come, that's Christmas to (the children)," Kendrick said.

Adair County established its Operation Christmas Child relay center in 2011 at Columbia Baptist Church. In the last two years, members of dozens of area churches, civic organizations and Lindsey Wilson College have dropped off shoeboxes filled with items for children to be delivered around the world.

Named in honor of a former OCC volunteer leader in Kentucky, the Bruce Paul Kramp Faithful Servants Award is presented to the Danville Area county with the largest one-year increase in the number of boxes collected

Efforts are already under way for the 2013 OCC collection week, according to Adair County co-coordinators Denise Fudge and Carrie Redford. Shoeboxes with items can be dropped off at the Adair County relay center during the week of Nov. 18-25, 2013. For more information about OCC, contact Fudge at fudged@lindsey.edu or (270) 378-6356 or Redford at redfordc@lindsey.edu or (270) 634-3347.

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CUTLINE FOR PICTURE
LWC OCC AWARD --  Monday morning in the Lindsey Wilson College L.R. McDonald Administration Building from members of the Operation Christmas Child Danville, Ky., Area team. From left: OCC Danville Area Coordinator Kathy Kendrick; OCC Danville Area Network Coordinator Jean Denny; Melton; Harris; LWC Vice President for Educational Outreach and Student Financial Services Denise Fudge; and LWC Financial Aid Technical Associate Carrie Redford. Fudge and Redford help coordinate the Adair County OCC relay center.

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Contact: Duane Bonifer
boniferd@lindsey.edu
(270) 384-8212