Teresa Boyles helps put on Thanksgiving dinner for people who need it or just want to be able to show up and enjoy the delicious food. She helps the volunteer group People Helping People which puts on the dinner for the community out of the Saint Agnes school building. When it came to deciding if the dinner would be put on for more holidays Larry, the original person to put it on, decided that he only wanted it for thanksgiving due to it being a “lost holiday”. In the past, they would deliver meals to people throughout the community but now they do more of a drive-up and pick up or eat inside. When it comes down to buying everything necessary for the dinner People Helping People will try to buy all the ingredients locally but go to Sam’s Club to get the ingrediants that they can’t get in town. Some people will bring in deserts to help out but other than that they do everything else with volunteer help from the community making sure everything gets cooked properly.

They begin cooking all of the food during the week starting on Tuesday and spanning through Thursday. Then they will start pickups around 10:30 to 11 a.m. Thanksgiving day, then serve the community till 1 p.m. 

The community has helped support this generous act by donating money by putting it into the account at Consumers Cooperative Credit Union or dropping off money to Teresa herself. There have also been donations while people are eating or when the food gets dropped off or picked up. With the people in town supporting People Helping People through donations or showing up to carve turkeys and serve food, there have been a lot of good years and good stories to come out of it all. 

Although People Helping People happens once a year there are other groups such as the Senior Center which helps people year-round. The Senior Center gets food donations from Safeway and then the senior center helps distribute the food throughout the community for people in need. In the senior center parking lot, they will be giving out 270 sets of food boxes to the community where it is first come first serve. Although, it is senior-based, kids are welcome to come during lunch to talk to the seniors and hear stories from them. They also have medical equipment that they can loan out such as wheelchairs, walkers, and crutches. 

 Within the foreseeable future, they plan on having a mobile food truck that is sponsored by Northwest Community Action, Heartland Food Bank of America, and the Retired Senior Volunteer Program. To get any further information about either of these groups you can contact Teresa Boyles at (308) 762 – 4539, if she does not answer leave a message with your name and phone number, she is with People Helping People. For more information about the senior center contact Angie at (308) 762 – 8774.