Annual Recycle Event this weekend features Petersburg donations

Some of the items donated this week at Petersburg’s seventh-annual Project Connect Resource Fair will make it to Wrangell for a community clothing and household goods distribution.

“It’s nice to have a change of clothes from another town,” Joan Sargent said of the fourth-annual Recycle Event sponsored by the Wrangell community service organization BRAVE, Building Respect and Valuing Everyone.

If all goes on schedule, the U.S. Coast Guard will bring the donated goods from Petersburg to Wrangell on Wednesday, Jan. 31, barring an emergency response call that diverts the crew, Sargent said last week.

The donated items will be set out on tables at the Island of Faith Lutheran Church on Second Street and available for the public’s choosing from 1 to 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 2, and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 3.

“We just open the doors” and people can start filling their bags, said Sargent, a volunteer with BRAVE. “We ask — not require — a $5 donation (to BRAVE) per bag.”

The money is used for BRAVE’s backpack program, which provides essentials “for people who have nothing and can’t return home,” whether because of a fire, domestic violence or any other reason, Sargent said.

The backpacks “are stuffed as full as we can get them” with clothes, personal hygiene items and other essentials, and distributed through the police, hospital emergency room, The Salvation Army, SEARHC’s behavioral health office and other agencies, she said.

The annual event to share Petersburg’s collections with Wrangell started kind of small, Sargent said. The state public health nurse who serves the two communities came up with the idea to connect the two towns.

“We get a fair amount of children’s clothes,” she said, and also clothes for adults, shoes, bedding and other household items.

Last year, more than 65 boxes of donated items arrived in Wrangell.

Petersburg’s Project Connect Resource Fair collects goods and provides free resources for people experiencing “housing insecurity,” which includes those without a permanent home, such as people couch surfing or struggling to maintain housing month-to-month.