Visalia Breakfast Lions President Stephen Johnson announced our Club will deliver 1000 turkeys to various organizations in Visalia on Monday November 19, 2018. The Club has been donating turkeys each Thanksgiving for the last 24 years and this is by far the largest donation they have made and is the signature donation event of the year. Members meet at the Willow Glen Antiques at 7:00 AM on Monday to load the turkeys into their vehicles and begin the caravan delivering the turkeys.
Deliveries start at 8:00 AM with stops at Bethlehem Center, Central Valley Regional Center, Salvation Army, Blind Babies, Visalia Rescue Mission, Visalia Emergency Aid, National Guard, VFW, Kaweah Delta Hospice, Family Service, Family Builders Foster Care, Tulare Christian Schools, New Vision Men and Women Outreach, Sequoia High School, CASA, C-Set, and the Visalia Second Baptist Church. Robinson is quoted saying “Turns out that a lot of these places were so thankful they were not forgotten,” he said. “It is truly rewarding to us that people give us the opportunity to help.”
Club members collect funds from their fines at Club meetings, donations from members themselves, support from Cal Water, a raffle for a gift certificate at Sportsman Warehouse and other donations. This allows the Club to purchase turkeys with support from Costco and Walmart Neighborhood Market on Demaree St.
The Lions motto is “We Serve” and this is the Breakfast Lions effort to help the under-served and needy families that otherwise may not enjoy the Thanksgiving Holiday. The Club delivers the turkeys to the agencies that best meets the needs of the less fortunate. The Breakfast Lions are dedicated to this event and are deeply moved when delivering the turkeys that help so many families.
All turkeys are committed this year but if an organization has a need the Club is looking forward to next year, our 25th year of giving, and will consider new requests. Event coordinator Kelly Robinson can be reached at 559-303-1110 or by email at [email protected]
The Visalia Breakfast Lions Club has again helped many families in our valley have a special Thanksgiving. This year our club provided 1100 turkeys for families who requested help with their Thanksgiving meal. The requests for help with turkeys were made from many agencies in our valley and the Visalia Breakfast Lions club went into action. We purchased the turkeys from two local retailers who really helped with the costs of the turkeys. We would like to thank Manager Allison from Walmart on Demaree and Meat Manager Frank of Costco in Visalia for making the price of 1100 turkeys affordable for our club to purchase.
We also would like to thank Jordan Mitchell for making all the calls to set up the locations that had a turkey need this year. We appreciate Kelly Robinson and Ed Wristen for taking the lead again on this project. This was the 24th year that our club has donated turkeys for families in our community. Also we thank Ramon Perez for again donating a truck and driver to pick up the turkeys. We also thank our President Stephen Johnson for saying we were upping our numbers of turkeys we would give away from 800 to 1000, and then finding there was more need so we took the number of turkeys donated to 1100. A huge thank you to our club members who pay fines the months of October and November and the support that comes from the heart of the members and for all of their help in delivering all of the turkeys. Again, another way that people come together to help others! What a wonderful community we live in.
