Shelter Insurance donates to Helping Hands

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  • Pictured from left to right, Alyssa Ludi, Lean Elliot and Kristin Ludi present the donation to Sabra and Thomas Denson, founders of Helping Hands.
    Pictured from left to right, Alyssa Ludi, Lean Elliot and Kristin Ludi present the donation to Sabra and Thomas Denson, founders of Helping Hands.
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With a community in need, two organizations are ready to help.

Shelter Insurance agent Kristin Ludi donated $1,000 to the Helping Hands Community Foundation.

“Shelter wanted to reach out and allow their agents to help out in their community,” Ludi said. “We have a foundation that the Shelter puts money into every year. Then, in times like this, they’re able to extend that out the agents.”

As a response to COVID-19, Ludi said Shelter Insurance told all their agents that they will be giving each agent $1,000 to donate to a local charity that is working to help the community through this pandemic.

“This is the first time that something like this has obviously happened,” Ludi said. “It was very generous.”

Ludi was open for ideas and asked the public’s help finding a local charity.

“I knew instantly that this was the one,” she said. “This seemed to be the one that was doing the most locally.”

Helping Hands is a nonprofit organization based in Chandler, Oklahoma.

“Our motto is, ‘We help the hungry, hurting and helpless,’” co-founder Sabra Denson said.

Sabra said they strive to meet different needs within the community.

“When schools started closing, we started doing food boxes for kids,” she said. “We’ve served over 200 kids since the start of COVID.”

A food box lasts these kids a week and is full of snacks, produce, bread, cereal, etc.

The cost to create a food box varies for $30-$50, depending what’s in the box.

Sabra said this donation will allow them to provide food boxes to those in need throughout the summer.

“It’s going to be able to feed more kids,” she said.

Sabra said they have extended their food boxes to the elderly, disabled and single mothers.

However, Helping Hands does more than just food boxes. They have several outdoor food pantries, they give out free clothes and host a resource fair every year.

“Our goal is to get a pantry in every town in Lincoln County,” Sabra said.

Currently they have three boxes and are building three more. The boxes are stocked by the community with the idea to “Leave what you can, take what you need.”

“They’ll be putting one here at my office,” Ludi said.

Co-founder Thomas Denson said they have a variety of items in the outdoor food pantries like shampoo and diapers.

Thomas and Sabra started this non profit two years ago when they saw a need in the community.

“God just kind of moved us,” Thomas said.

Sabra said they felt a desire to do God’s work and begin helping people.

“We just recently quit our jobs to soley invest in Helping Hands,” she said.

Moving forward, Sabra and Thomas plan on opening a store front in Chandler on May 15.

Sabra said they will have several clothing racks set up, including a business section with interview clothes.

“It would really help, if we could get more help,” Thomas said.

Sabra said they are most active on their Facebook page where they host charity donations and contact those in need.

Volunteers can get involved by joining the Dream Team group on Facebook.

Checks can be made out to Helping Hands Community Foundation and mailed to PO Box 44, Chandler Ok. 74834. Hands.