We here at The Salvation Army would like to thank all who stepped up to “Help Us, Help Haines” this Christmas season. We had several local agencies sign up and helped us with our holiday fundraising which made such a big difference. We would like to thank the Haines Borough Police Department, the Haines Volunteer Fire Department, and the American Legion, as well as many local churches for taking several shifts at the red kettle. We also had the Glacier Bears girls’ basketball team sign up again this year. We had many new people sign up to take a few hours at the red kettle and that in itself is so helpful to us and helps spread cheer to your friends and neighbors.


We would also like to thank those who gave so generously throughout this Christmas season. One I would like to mention is our new friends to The Salvation Army family here in Haines, Roger Beasley, Karen Pospisil and Lynn View Lodge & Rental Cars, and personally thank them for their generous donation, and their willingness to “Help Us, Help Haines”. We also received a donation from the good folks at Constantine. There were also several other local folks who made heartfelt donations who chose to remain anonymous, but you know who you are, and We Thank You.


Although it was a community effort, I would like to also thank Mike Ward and all his staff and employees at Howsers market for making their building available for our Kettle Stand. We would also like to thank the good folks at Olerud’s Market for hosting a manned kettle as well, and two counter kettles. We also had a counter kettle at Mountain Market, as well as a counter kettle at Alaska Rod’s. The school did a great canned food drive for us, and we thank them as well. I would also like to give a special thank you to the Uglys of Haines, for allowing us to once again partner with them and do the distribution of the toys that were collected at the Uglys of Haines “Gifts For Grub.” This has turned out to be a great partnership and we are looking forward to continuing this for many years to come.


Because of everyone in this community giving of their time, treasures and talents. We were able to assist our fellow Alaskans with 150 holiday food boxes, including a holiday meal, 65 families including 120 children with Christmas gifts, we also assisted 32 seniors and shut-ins with Christmas gifts which gave them the joy of Christmas that they might not have known without your generosity.

A couple of weeks before Christmas I was starting to get a little worried because we were a long way from meeting our goal, but once again the good folks of Haines came through to show the true Christmas spirit. We ended our Christmas season with about $1000 over our goal, and we could not have done it without you, “The Friends of The Salvation Army.”.
Thank you to all for a great Christmas, but please remember “Need Knows No Season.”

In His service
Captains Kevin & Serina Woods

Paid Commentary by Kevin Woods