Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth Spreads Christmas Cheer
Article Presented By Scioto Valley Dumpsters, LTD.
(Piketon) – For more than three decades, employees at the Fluor-BWXT Portsmouth site in Piketon have celebrated Christmas with a wave of joyful giving. In 1993, a group of employees founded the Christmas Gifts for Children Program which now benefits thousands of children from disadvantaged families in southern Ohio and parts of Kentucky. The program draws hundreds of volunteers and donations.
Gift coordinators began preparing for the season by placing Christmas trees with the wish lists of eligible children inside area businesses. Each tag represents a child in the community who might otherwise be forgotten at Christmas time.
The program now serves more than 2,800 children. One of the challenges is ensuring that families are unique and not already receiving gifts from similar endeavors.
“As an empty nester and great-grandmother, it feels good to give a little piece of my heart to the children,” FBP Project Controls Specialist Valerie Johnson said. “All of my family lives out of state, so this program provides a way for me to spread a little Christmas cheer.”
Gary Crandall, a former employee of the Portsmouth site, is the president of the Christmas Gifts for Children Program.
“Every year our delivery volunteers find families who are really suffering and unable to buy any gifts for their children,” Crandall said. “The gifts provided by this program are a God-send to the hard-working parents who are just unable to make ends meet. The looks of relief on their faces when the deliveries are made are priceless.”
The site holds various fundraisers such as silent auctions, and ornament or wreath sales. The proceeds help ensure that no child within reach is forgotten at Christmas. Gifts are provided to children from Pike, Ross, Jackson, Scioto, and Adams counties in Ohio, as well as two schools in Kentucky (Greenup and Lewis counties).
