2023-12-20

Communities come up strong once again in support of senior gift-giving programs

SOUTH SHORE - You don't have to look hard to find instances where people on the South Shore show their generosity, especially during this time of year.

There are so many programs that help people enjoy this time of season and two such programs, Santa's for South Shore and Santa for Seniors Queens County, continue to see an uptick in the people they help and those that continue to give to towards the program.

Both programs have been running for five years.

Shannon Stewart, head of the South Shore program, says that this year's campaign went well.

"We started early this year. We made that decision last year because we had a whole whack of last minute things happen. You know, you make notes and you get better every year. We already have notes for next year," she said.

This year, they began spreading the word in August and they began taking nominations in October and asked for lists from nursing homes a little earlier, by the end of October.

And it was as a record year...with about 520 gift bags going out, as compared to 430 last year. All of the gifts were collected, stored and sorted at the LighthouseNOW office.

"I think a lot of it is awareness. The group gets bigger and more people are talking about," she said about the growing number of gift recipients.

She anticipates that next year, more seniors will be available to be adopted because of the expected opening of the new nursing home in Mahone Bay.

Stewart is also finding that more people outside of the South Shore are asking for help.

"I had a gentleman from Halifax messaging me that his neighbour is elderly and she has stage four cancer and her daughter is looking after her and may lose her job soon," she recalled. "He said I just heard about this group at work, so he reached out," she said, adding that she referred him to a group in HRM, but they were not taking any more nominations."

They reached out again to Stewart who decided to adopt the senior.

Stewart said the continued support for the program continues to astound her.

"This year I didn't really know what to expect because a lot of people are down financially. We all live in the same world, you hear it, everyone is struggling, some people who have never struggle before are now struggling," she said.

"But people were outrageously generous this year. I don't know where they pulled it from. Maybe because we started early and they were able to budget or pick things up earlier? Maybe that may be a bit of a benefit. The gifts that came in were just overflowing."

She added that they even collected extra things this year.

As well, for the first time, the group did a bit of fundraising, because it was a bit of a squeeze on funds last year. The group auctioned off several Oak Island items in a silent auction and had great response, especially from American folks. The auction raised more than $3,000.

This definitely helped Stewart and her elves breath a little sigh of relief and give them a nest egg for the upcoming years.

Even after doing this for the past four years, Stewart said that there are times, when she gets emotional.

"It doesn't hit me every year until I do, I deliver to a lot of the individual people, because my name is listed for the program, I feel more comfortable in doing most of these. Others may not know that they were nominated, so you don't know what you're walking into," she said.

"That's when it hits me. For the new recipients there are tears sometimes, there's shock, there's confusion because they don't know who you are and the gifts are enormous...they get all choked up and that's when it gets to me. Until then, I think I just hold my breath, keep my emotions at bay and try to just get everything done and make sure we have all our ducks in a row."

Although admitting a little bias, Stewart said that this is an extremely important program and she considers seniors as being the most vulnerable in our society.

"I put them in the same group as children, but children, a lot of times are taken care of, at least you hope they are. There are a lot of programs and resources in place for them, but I really feel that all of this is lacking for seniors. They are often humble and don't want to ask for help. It's their generation and it's horrible because they can end up getting so down, and so depressed," she said.

"A lot them are forgotten about. Nanny was just dropped off and the family doesn't live here any more. I'm not just saying that, I've heard this first hand many times, coming right out of their mouths and the staff will confirm that. It could be 15 years since they've seen their family. I can't fathom that. So yes, this is extremely important."

Stewart adds that the receiving is just one part, giving is also a big part of the equation.

"For the Santas who adopt, they all have the same attitude. 'This is incredible. This made our Christmas. Out of everything else that we do, this was the most rewarding,'" recalling some of the comments she's heard.

Along with the individual Santas, there are also many groups, such as a local ladies' bridge group and the Project Linus group who have gotten involved. Businesses also have been helping out and many step up each year to help out by adopting or contributing to the program.

Santa for Seniors Queens County

Also in its fifth year of operation, this project spearheaded by Kendra Shot, saw 315 seniors get adopted this year.

"It went really well and everyone got adopted really fast this year," she said. "Last year we kind of pushed it to the week before Christmas because we didn't have everyone adopted."

A bit different from the South Shore-based group, nominations do not come from manors or seniors homes, because Shot said they have their own programs that take care of that.

Prior to 2022, actual gifts were collected that would be delivered by elves to the individual residents, however, for the last two years Shot and her crew went the gift card route, so people would purchase the cards and drop them off at certain locations, then they would be mailed out.

However, Shot said next year, they will be going back to the gift-giving.

"People miss buying gifts, but we haven't had a place to store the gifts," she said, adding that they have used the former 'call centre' for the first few years, but that is now full. But a new location has been secured. "The cards are beneficial don't get me wrong, but the fact that the seniors had somebody come to the door, have one-on-one contact and the gifts are something to open on Christmas morning."