Soldier leads charge for holiday charity

Courtesy Photo | Pfc. Jasmine Irving makes her way inside Catholic Social Services with gift wrapped packages of donated items for the shelters and their occupants.  

JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, AK, UNITED STATES

12.17.2010

Courtesy Story

United States Army Alaska

By Staff Sgt. Matthew E. Winstead

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Pfc. Jasmine Irving, a supply clerk with 4th Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, based at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, made her way through the snow-packed streets of downtown Anchorage Dec. 17 with a load of donated items to benefit area homeless families through the local Catholic Social Services Center.

Irving was accompanied by two of her fellow Soldiers and one of their children to help unload the donation she has collected over the past few weeks. Local media was present to cover the event, which was mostly driven by Irving’s own determination and generosity.

“I received approval to do this from the installation and my chain of command, but I did this pretty much on my own,” Irving said. “I did have help here and there. My friends and coworkers helped out a lot. But this wasn’t an Army thing, I started it and I kept telling people about it.”

She set up two collection points on post for donations. Flyers she designed and word of mouth helped raised awareness for the project.

Originally, Irving’s project was intended to directly benefit a shelter in Anchorage called the Brother Francis Shelter, whose clients include homeless families. However, that facility is just a part of CSS and wouldn’t be able to make full use of the wide variety of items Irving helped to collect. By making the donation to CSS itself, the items could them be sorted, and distributed to where they could be most useful.

Ellen Lawlor Krsnak, director of Community Relations and Advocacy at CSS, said she was very pleased to receive the donation.

“It warms the heart to see people that take so much from their own time to help others,” Krsnak said. “It reminds you that there are good people out there.”

Items like the toys and books will go to places that cater to families and children while the clothes and food will be provided to the shelters and the CSS food pantry.

“We will do our very best to make sure that all of the pieces of the donation go to where they will do the very most good,” Krsnak said.

Irving delivered the majority of the items packaged in Christmas gift bags and was able to leave the donation by a Christmas tree display set up in the main lobby of CSS. The additional tags on the bags and wrappings detailed the contents of the packages and made visual identification of the containers an easy process.

• Date Taken: 12.17.2010
• Date Posted: 12.17.2010 20:00
• Story ID: 62189
• Location: JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, AK, US