Brigade gets new leaders

A new president and vice president will be taking the reins of the Newton County Food Basket Brigade, it was announced during a wrap-up meeting Wednesday at First Christian Church.

Robert Allen and Lewis Cole, president and vice president respectively, have stepped down. The new president and vice president will be Terry Cook and Larry Johnson.

“It has been a reward and it has been a challenge,” Allen said. “We just watched it grow. Every year it gets bigger and it gets better. We tweak it every year so there are improvements getting made so it just makes it fine-tuned. It has just been a challenge and it has been a pleasure and a rewarding experience.”

Both Allen and Cole have been involved with the charity for a number of years and have seen improvements throughout.

“We have streamlined the registration, we have streamlined the way people come and go through the lines, the way to get the homebound so it gets along a lot quicker, we have worked on the outline areas so we get that done on Friday now, we have started to pick up food in the outlining areas at schools and businesses,” Allen said. “People have done this for so many years and the more that you do, the better that you get at it.”

Johnson said he was honored for this appointment.

“This is only the second year that I have been real involved with it,” Johnson said. “I know that it is very worthwhile and I am honored to be asked.

“Robert Allen talked me into it,” Johnson added with a laugh. “Really, he kind of influenced me that it would be something that I would be that he got a lot from and I will try my best to do.”

For the past two years, Johnson has helped out by using his truck and trailer to pick up food from the schools. He has also been in charge of picking up boxes to be used during the brigade.

“I hope that we can serve as many people as we did this year and if more,” said Johnson. “This year was a really good year.”

Adding to his comments, Cook also expressed his honor on being with the group.

“This is a major, major compliment,” Cook said. “I am really excited about it. This is going to be great.”

Cook said with his career, he has some free time in December and wanted to help out.

“I have known Robert for a long time. He said, ‘come in, we can put you to work,’ ” Cook said. “I thought that it would be just passing something out or putting boxes together, he said, hey we are looking for a new president. It is great, this is a wonderful, wonderful organization. We want to do anything and everything to make it bigger and better. Anything that we can do. People that really need this stuff, we want to sure that they will get it. That is the bottom line. That is what we are all here for. I am excited, we are excited.”

Cook wants to keep the tradition alive.

“We want to maintain business as usual if we can,” he said. “2009 could be a challenging year for the economy. But we are going to try to do everything we can to do at the end what we did this year, if not more.”

Prior to the kickoff date of the 2008 food basket brigade, the organizers set a goal of feeding 1,100 families and a goal of 100,000 pounds of food. During the wrap up meeting Wednesday night, it was announced that 1,150 families signed up, with 87 no shows, 20 new families came to the armory, nine new families to the help center and14 were no shows at the help center, giving a total of 1,106 families served or 3,809 individuals.  Compared to last year, there were 897 families or 3,411 individuals served.

“It was made so by the cooperation of all of the people in Newton County,” said Allen. “We appreciate all of that that they did to make it go. We were down food, but up on the monetary quite a bit. It was a good year, a record year.”

An organizational meeting will be set up at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 4, with a location to be
determined.