Legacy Parenting Organizing Citywide Diaper Drive to Meet Local Need

Legacy Parenting Organizing Citywide Diaper Drive to Meet Local Needs

by David Dinsmore

Though Legacy Parenting Center primarily serves clients in providing education for local parents and guardians of young children, it also helps meet some of the physical needs of these families as well.

Diapers are one of the top items they provide, and that has never been truer than this year.

Legacy is a member of the National Diaper Bank Network, which allows them to increase their ability to buy large quantities of diapers at an affordable cost. These supplies in the past have typically gone to benefit the clients who come to them for their educational programs. Network membership also helps in identifying and securing grant opportunities in addition to other resources and advocacy efforts.

The network will be hosting its 9th annual Diaper Need Awareness Week Sept. 21-27, and the Legacy staff has been working with the community to give locals opportunities to get involved.

This year in particular has put a lot of strain on network members’ supplies of diapers, as families that used these resources to supplement their own babies’ diaper stock have found themselves out of work temporarily or longterm as a result of the response to the coronavirus pandemic.

“We've seen – not just in Shawnee but in Pott County and surrounding cities – our diaper distributions go up 61 percent since March,” Legacy executive director Lacey Holt said. “They asked all of the diaper bank members across the country to just help raise awareness, because one in three families suffers from diaper need. That's the ability to keep their baby clean, dry and healthy. That was before the pandemic, so I'd be very interested to see nationally what that number is now.”

As of late August, Legacy had given out 107,000 diapers to 490 babies since the beginning of the year, Holt said. This surpasses their previous year highs with four months still left in 2020.

The staff and volunteers at Legacy began preparing for the diaper awareness week push long before its official start on Sept. 21. Holt said she has been trying to work with the city to file an official proclamation to declare a local Diaper Need Awareness Week. They have also worked with local organizations and individuals on past

diaper drives of their own, so they reached out to some of those contacts to set up ways for people in the community to conveniently contribute to the upcoming drive.

“The ability to just go to Walmart and buy a package of diapers, not everyone has that luxury,” Holt said. “It's something you don't think about until you're in it.”

In many places, diapers were some of the items that were subject to the apparent panic buying of common household items – with toilet paper serving the most publicized example of such behavior – in the early days of the response, leading to limited availability of diapers to shoppers who normally can buy a package of diapers at the store, Holt said. Then as stores began limiting hours or even closing temporarily, finding diapers became an even taller task for some.

As such, the staff and volunteers at Legacy have been putting a lot of efforts into this year’s drive to ensure their organization will not only be able to continue serving the needs of their clients as well as non-clients in the county who qualify for emergency resources thanks to funding by local businesses, organizations and beyond.

There are a variety of ways locals can contribute to the upcoming drive, Holt said. The most obvious way would be to donate diapers directly, whether at a designated drop-off location listed or Legacy’s office at 126 S. Center St. Locations confirmed by late August include FireLake Discount Foods at 1570 S. Gordon Cooper Drive, Shawnee Family YMCA at 700 W. Saratoga and First United Bank locations at 2675 N. Harrison and 4439 N. Kickapoo in Shawnee and 301 N. Broadway St. in Tecumseh. Those considering this option may consider contributing some larger sizes as there always seems to be fewer available than smaller baby sizes. There is also always a need for wipes, which sometimes gets overlooked during diaper drives.

Others have discussed organizing smaller drives to contribute to the larger local effort by hosting events at work, church or within families to give people the chance to donate.

Those not wanting to venture out to donate can log on to legacyshawnee. com, Holt said. There are links there for financial contributions that go to providing for the diaper needs of local families and also a link to the organization’s Amazon Wish List featuring diapers and other items provided by Legacy.

For those not in a position to purchase or donate, there are options of helping spread awareness of the diaper drive, Holt said. This can be done by word of mouth, social media, club or group meetings, etc. Legacy has created a toolkit that can help groups or individuals spread the word about the diaper drive and the need it aims to serve.

Legacy also accepts partial packages of diapers, Holt said. All the diapers they receive get shrink wrapped at the location, so those with leftover packages of unused diapers their baby has outgrown can bring them to Legacy so volunteers can package them together into the standard pack of 25.

It takes quite a bit of time to create those packages, which is why volunteering for that and other functions at Legacy is another avenue for locals to get involved with the diaper drive and the organization’s mission as a whole, Holt said. Many volunteers who have regularly served the organization are older and fall into the higher risk groups for contracting COVID-19. With resuming its normal hours of 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday for their clients, Legacy needs a regular roster of volunteers to help

with tasks like repackaging the diapers received – especially in light of a potential higher influx during the drive. They have seen churches, youth groups and others organize people to help provide the necessary manpower, but most are just individuals looking for ways to lend a hand to families who could use it.

“We have had some very faithful people that have continued to serve with us, but a lot of our volunteers have elected to stay home just for safety reasons – and we don't blame them one bit,” Holt said. “But our need hasn't stopped. Especially now, now that we've reopened. People are bringing us donations in clothing, toys, those kinds of things. It just takes more manpower to really go through and sort through it and make sure everything's clean and nice.”

Legacy made the decision to open its center – observing all recommended safety measures – because there is an element of support in the in-person parenting education clients receive that they missed during the organization’s 16-week lockdown.

“We have some clients that want to come to the center, and they want to be back for appointments,” Holt said. “But we also have online parent education, that they could do from home and then schedule a curbside pickup to come and get their diapers, wipes and formula via curbside. So, our community families that are calling that just need help with those resources, we schedule them to come for curbside pickup, and we just bring their diapers out to the car.”

For more information about diaper drive, volunteer opportunities or services available, call Legacy at (405) 432- 2844 or visit legacyshawnee.com.

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