Cheer Basket program gets scaled back

The Cheer Basket Program, which provides food for the needy during the Christmas season, will be scaling back considerably this year.

The project, which has faced declining donation support of food and money in recent years, will be shifting the focus to churches and food banks to provide the help people need, supplementing that assistance with a $15 voucher.

For more than 50 years, needy families in Mountain Home and the surrounding area have been able to rely on the annual Cheer Basket project for their Christmas turkey and other food items donated by area families.

The program began when two women, the late Vinnie Sorenson and Pearl White, decided to start helping families that needed extra food at Christmas. Over the years, they provided at least 25-30 families a year with some holiday hope and cheer. In the late 1980s, well past retirement age, they finally gave up the project and it was picked up by the Mountain Home News, under editor Kelly Everitt's direction. With additional resources available, the project was expanded to over 200 families.

Everitt was succeeded after two years by Paul Copenhaven, who continued for several years to coordinate extensive community efforts to raise food for the families that needed it most during the holidays. When Copenhaven retired, the project was adopted by the Mountain Home Jaycees, who ran it until they disbanded in 2002. By that time over 250 families were being served each year.

When the Jaycees disappeared, a group of civic-minded private citizens got together and organized Mountain Home Cheer Basket, Inc., which took over the responsibility "to see to it that no needy family who asks for food goes hungry at Christmas time," said Mike Crawford, the current vice president of the organization.

He noted that under the stewardship of Mountain Home Cheer Basket, Inc., the group was "proud to report that we have provided about 1,000 local residents each year with turkey, stuffing, bread, milk, eggs, peanut butter, canned goods, and other essential food items.

"Cheer Basket is also proud that we have never required anyone to prove that they were needy in order to get a food package. If you asked for one, you got it, no questions asked.

"But over the last few years," Crawford said, "as economic conditions have worsened, contributions of food and money have dropped drastically while the need has grown.

"Cheer Basket is in competition with several other food charities, including church food pantries, El-Ada Inc., and the Idaho Food Bank. Those charities all operate year-round, and all require some proof that the person requesting food is truly needy.

"The board of directors of Cheer Basket believe that in this time of significant hardship for everybody, we should not compete with those need-based programs for scarce resources. When the cupboard is bare, we have to make sure the plates we can fill are truly empty."

As a result, Mountain Home Cheer Basket, Inc. will no longer provide food packages this year as in years past.

Instead, they will provide every family who is receiving a distribution from any participating local food pantry in December with a coupon that can be exchanged for $15 toward the price of a turkey or other holiday meat item at Paul's Market in Mountain Home.

"Any family receiving a food distribution from any of our participating charities can sign up for a voucher and we will send one out," Crawford said.

The organization will be sending out a letter to every local church explaining the changes, along with a separate sign-up sheet for turkey vouchers.

"We will also keep track of names and addresses to avoid duplications," Crawford said. "We will be sending our vouchers out within three to seven days after people sign up for them. The vouchers will only be good through Dec. 31, 2008, at Paul's Market in Mountain Home.

"Cheer Basket recommends that if you have food or money that you would like to donate, please contact El-Ada or any local church food pantry, so that your donations will stay in the community," Crawford said.

"The directors of Cheer Basket want to thank all of the people whose generous donations and volunteer efforts have made it possible to help so many of our neighbors in years past, and to encourage those of us who can to give generously to other food charities this year and in years to come. Thank you for your support."

The Mountain Home Cheer Basket, Inc., board of directors, consists of President Terry Ratliff, Crawford as vice president, Secretary-Treasurer Alain Isaac, and directors Chuck Devol, Geoff Schroeder and Bryan Straw.