Free Wrapping Wraps Up
If you’re feeling overwhelmed with last minute preparations for Christmas, Habitat for Humanity ReStore has a little help. Florence Habitat Board President Alice Burns said they’ve been offering gift wrapping once again.
“Happy Wrappers is a yearly thing that we do at ReStore for the community, anybody can bring in their gifts.”
Just bring your unwrapped gifts to ReStore, next to Grocery Outlet and volunteers will handle it.
“Thursday, Friday and Saturday. This is the last week to get your presents wrapped and it is all free, but you can leave a donation.”
Burns said wrapping is happening from ten AM to two PM Thursday, Friday and Saturday. No matter how difficult your gifts are to wrap, there are two very important facts.
“We do it as a public service and all of our wrappers are very happy.”
Burns said you don’t want to wait too long. Saturday may be a pretty busy day for the wrappers, but they’ll still be happy.
Food Needs in Florence Area
The Christmas Season is often called the ‘Giving Season”, and for good reason. It brings out the generosity in people. Something that Colin Morgan, the Director of Florence Food Share is very grateful for.
“But then, January, February and March come and everyone’s like great, we did so awesome, and this is wonderful. But then there’s still people who need to be fed, there’s still people who aren’t able to make the bills.”
It happens every year, so Morgan prepares to continue meeting the need while “making do” with fewer cash and food donations after the new year. This year, he says, may be more of a challenge.
“We’re up substantially this year. You know, during the Thanksgiving weekend we fed 489 households in three days. Of course those numbers ebb and flow, they spike during the year.”
Florence Food Share gets about 40-percent of the food it distributes from “Food for Lane County”. Those are mainly the staples like beans, canned goods and the like. But, that leaves more than half of their food donations up to the generosity of local residents.
Business Licenses
Local businesses are required to renew their business licenses with the City of Florence. The city is now providing an online option for that to take place. Owners can go to ci.florence.or.us and there is a link on the home page that will direct you to the proper form. Businesses that do not complete their registration by January 24th of 2024 will be penalized 50% of the registration cost.