Hey everyone, my name is Anna Wills and this is my donation experience with the
Emergency Shelter of Northern Kentucky.
When I chose to raise funds and gather donations for my birthday I didn’t know how far it would go. I started this project to raise awareness and to get my foot in the door for what I want to do in the future. With help from my mom, youth group, school, and my dad’s work; we ended up raising $1,310 and collecting tons of boxes and bags full of donations.
It all started in mid-April. With a week of planning and coming up with a flyer for the project it was finally time to step into action. When we started sharing the flyers on April 25th I didn’t think that we would get donations so quickly. The very next day one of my mom’s piano students had brought a bag of donations. Later that evening when I was going through what they had donated I started crying tears of joy. This was the first time that it had actually occurred to me that this is what I wanted to do the rest of my life.
Then the donations started really pouring in from everywhere. By the time that the collection had ended; I couldn’t believe my eyes, it was way more than I could have imagined.
When I showed Jonathan Kneisley, my Biology teacher at Walton Verona HS, my flyer he was all for it and introduced me to the Emergency Shelter of Northern Kentucky. He said that since our school usually does a food drive in the fall and does a shanty-town experience; that I should send all of the donations towards the same place and that he would help me get in contact with their executive director Kim Webb.
I contacted Kim once I had finished with the collecting process. Kim was very sweet and was ecstatic that I had donations for her crew. We decided to meet up on a Friday to transfer the donations to where they belong — in the arms of people who really need them.
Now I will admit that this was my first time in the heart of Covington and I was a little skeptical at first. This all changed once we arrived at the shelter. Kim greeted us and we even got to meet some of the people that come in for food and other necessities. Everyone was super sweet and I loved getting to just be in the moment and to connect with random strangers. Kim helped us get the boxes of donations into the shelter and then she gave us a tour of the building.
The building was alive with welcoming arms that would help anyone who needed it. This was a temporary living space for men and women to stay overnight and get
out into the world during the day. While on the tour we got the back story from a very nice lady. She had been out on the streets a few times but now she has her own place and comes to get food and other necessities from the shelter.
Kim continued on with the tour and told us the story of how they were able to get the place the shelter is now in on Scott Street to how they have another shelter being built that is twice the size. I loved getting to meet all of the workers and to get a feel of what I will soon hopefully be doing in the future.
My plans after college are to own and operate a homeless shelter where people can
come and stay for a bit while also learning how to get their feet on the ground, teaching them about God, and letting them face their addictions and the world. Coming to the shelter opened my eyes to a whole new world; one that I want to be a part of. I personally can’t wait for that time to come.