FARMERS BRANCH, Texas — The first group of employees who suffered property losses during Hurricane Ike began signing up last week for the Texas Credit Union League's Adopt a Family online service.
Under the arrangement, needy southeast Texas families who lost homes and livelihoods during the Labor Day storm are being matched up with benefactors from across Texas and the U.S. who fulfill wish lists, which include everything from toys to linens.
Within days of the Adopt a Family announcement, five families had already been matched up with benefactors.
The stories of employee courage in adversity are posted on the Texas league Web site, http://www.tcul.coop/Adopt-a-Family, under a special Adopt a Family Christmas tree.
In respect to privacy concerns, the names of national donors or recipients are not listed, but the wish list shares tales of woe.
"I try to understand why my children are crying, and I tell them we can't change what nature has brought upon us," writes "Gloria," a mother of two who lost her home. And another "who lost everything" relates how her epileptic daughter just seeks some new clothes and "shirts for my husband."
Officials of the league and the Texas Credit Union Foundation stressed that need is great for basic goods like clothes and furnishings, but toys can also "help bring a little joy during the holidays."
Employee needs remain overwhelming, noted a league spokesman, "considering there have been 900 grants already handed out by the foundation to employees who made application."
Most of those applications were converted into $500 checks mailed out by the Texas foundation and the National Credit Union Foundation as part of its national Ike disaster relief effort.
In a statement, the league said Adopt a Family-eligible families must include at least one CU employee "and have at least one child."
Separately, the league said that starting this week it is conducting free counseling sessions for Ike-affected employees in five coastal cities as part of a debriefing program led by a professional social worker.
The league said Charles A. Scott, who counseled hundreds of Katrina employees in Louisiana and Mississippi in 2005 on behalf of the Mississippi Credit Union Association, would be doing the same in Texas starting in Port Arthur Nov. 3 and ending a week later in Houston.
–jrubenstein@cutimes.com
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