Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: Welcome to the Clear Impact Podcast, brought to you by Mitre Brands University. Thanks for joining us today. My name is Sheri Conner and I am your host.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: All right, so we are here on the Clear Impact Podcast and we are.
[00:00:28] Speaker B: Recording at the Hershey Lodge.
[00:00:30] Speaker A: And so last night I had the privilege of sitting with these two lovely ladies. And so I'll let you guys introduce yourselves and you can talk just briefly about your organization and what brings you here. So we'll start with you.
[00:00:39] Speaker C: Hi, my name is Patricia Abney and I am the co chair of the Mitre foundation in Flower Mount, Texas.
So, working with the foundation for around six years. Been at MITRE for seven years. So I got involved because my boss said, hey, do you want to help me do something? And I'm like, sure, what do you want me to do? Hey, there's a home for the troops, and would you like to go with me? And I was hooked. I cried for 20 minutes while the guy spoke, and I was hooked. So I was like, I would love to join. So I joined, and for about a year, I worked with a lady named Deb Johnson who. Who decided she was gonna brand me into being a co chair. So I am a co chair. Been doing that for five years. And I do a lot with CCA food drives. I take a lot of my foundation work home with me. I do it on my lunch hour. I do it at home. So I work with all of our team members to get them what we call VTO hours. So it's voluntary time off. So each of our team members get 40 hours a year.
So I'm like, how do we promote team members to start helping people like cca? So I started asking team members, hey, do you want to go to a food drive? Do you want to go help CCA stack shelves?
Food drives that we do for other companies as well.
So last year we had a little over. So I'm going to say 500 volunteer hours.
[00:02:19] Speaker D: Wow.
[00:02:20] Speaker C: This year, we are over 3,000 volunteer hours just for this year. So it's something that I love to do. I love to work with Sandra. I love to help our team members.
And it affects my job in a way because I'm a quality person. So I see a lot of our team members.
I just want to see people help, you know, make everyone else's lives better.
[00:02:45] Speaker A: Right.
[00:02:46] Speaker C: So I think it's passionate to be doing it. And I never did this until I came to mitre.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:53] Speaker C: So I never did this in any of my other jobs that I worked at.
So I'M just glad to partner with CCA for the last. God, it's almost 10 years since I think Flower Mound has been in existence. I'm not sure. But I love partnering with Sandra and her love for helping people.
[00:03:13] Speaker A: That's amazing. So before we start chatting with you, Sandra, how many team members do you have at flower mound?
[00:03:17] Speaker C: Around 600, maybe less.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: Okay. That's a lot of people to coordinate and communicate with and then to organize events for them to serve.
[00:03:27] Speaker C: So I have two people, I call them on my team that help me out. I have a girl on second shift that gets volunteers from second shift, and I have a gentleman on first shift that helps me communicate with the people on first shift.
[00:03:41] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:03:41] Speaker C: So it really helps because I don't speak a lot of Spanish, so it kind of helps get the word out. And sometimes it's like, hey, I need to work. I want to do this, I want to do that. And I'm like, gotcha. Next week.
[00:03:53] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:03:53] Speaker C: So I'm basically some days turning people away because I don't have any hours of work for them. But the team loves it. We sell Miter shirts for the foundation, and we color coordinate when we go to these things. It is so awesome. So I love that the team member gets really involved in it.
[00:04:11] Speaker A: Sure. Giving is addictive. That's awesome. Good for you. That's exciting.
[00:04:15] Speaker C: I try.
[00:04:16] Speaker A: Yeah. No. And you guys were working the 5050 raffle today, and that was fun. I got to come in and heckle for a few minutes with you guys, which was so much fun.
[00:04:26] Speaker C: And I think we raised $1,600. I think they said around $1,600.
[00:04:31] Speaker A: Nice. And I was telling everybody, like, you know you're giving that back, right? If you win the 50 50, it's going to customary when it's a nonprofit fundraiser that you don't keep your half.
[00:04:40] Speaker C: I don't know if they did or.
[00:04:41] Speaker A: Not, but yeah, I saw another group later and was talking about it, and I told Matt, I told Matt you guys were killing it out there with your 50 50, and he loved that. So, Sandra, thank you for making time to chat with me. And we sat at dinner last night, which was your birthday yesterday.
[00:04:58] Speaker C: Happy birthday to you.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: And so tell us about your organization.
[00:05:03] Speaker D: So my name is Sandra Sims, and I work for Christian Community Action. It's a nonpro around for 52 and a half years. Wow. Started by seven members of a Bible study class, and that was studying Matthew 25.
And the next week they came back and they decided that they wanted to do something. They wanted to take care of their neighbors. And so that's how CCA actually started. And we're all about a hand up, not just a handout. So our programs are broken down at three stages is rescue, relief and restoration.
Rescue, that is rent, utility and food. They need it immediately.
The relief program is our children program. So back to school feeding kids in the summertime Christmas. And then we have our restorative program which is our classes, G D, esl, computer classes, job readiness counseling, and all at no cost to the family.
So we really try to make sure that the parents are the heroes in the story. Making sure they keep their dignity when they walk in.
[00:06:07] Speaker A: That's so important.
[00:06:09] Speaker D: Sometimes we can't help with finance, but we have so many other options out there. And so it's like we try to show them. Maybe we can't help you with your rent, but we have a large client choice food pantry that you can come in here and you can pick out your own groceries and then you're going to go through a register and check out just like you would do at a grocery store. Back to school. In the summertime we partner with Old Navy and the kids get to go in Old Navy and go back to school shopping. On top of that, we give them the backpack and the supplies. So it's like they truly have that experience. When that first day of school they say, I went back to school shopping. They truly go back to school shopping. And the program has also we've helped some homeless families. So we've put over 100 homeless into apartments for at least one year. And so for 12 months their rent is paid. But the first three, they don't have to pay anything. Then it's a sliding scale. But in that process it's like they can use the budgeting classes, the computer classes, the esl. We really try to move them from where they're at to the next stage. Most of the clients that come to us have a job. Some have two and some have three. We try to knock out that you don't have that three jobs that we can get you a career. So we work with some of the colleges. We have someone that's an emt, we have real estate. It's what do you need to get out of this situation. And that's what CCA does.
The partnership with the Miner foundation has just been amazing. They do give us money, but they're more than money. They're friends. We know that we can call them when we need the extra help in the food pantry to Unload. We know that when we have back to school that they're going to be there. They sign up. They're one of my first companies to want to sign up. Christmas time for our. We call our clients angels for our golden angels. We get them adopted out, which is our senior citizen. They're one of the companies that call me and say, hey, we want to adopt some of your clients for Christmas to make sure that the senior citizen have a wrap grip up under their tree. And it's so amazing to work with someone like that. Two years ago, they came and they was helping pack Christmas and JR realized while they was packing that we did not have enough teen gifts. So after their shift was over, they actually went and went shopping for teen gifts, called me up and had me to come and pick up the teen gifts so that we can pack the rest of our Christmas.
[00:08:33] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:08:34] Speaker D: And that is what this is more than money. It's relationship. It's building relationship. And it's like their heart is just unbelievable, just so big. And it's not just our organization that they do this with. They do it with Ronald McDonald. They do it with all the other St. Jude. But we're just blessed and lucky to have them as part of our family.
[00:08:55] Speaker A: And so you're located in Flower Mound.
[00:08:57] Speaker D: So the office is in Louisville, but we cover all of Denton County, Capell ISD and Frisco isd.
[00:09:05] Speaker B: We are sharing our expertise around all topics relating to the window and door industry. Whether you are a customer selling our products or a homeowner doing research, the Clear Impact podcast provides helpful content that makes an impact. Subscribe today wherever you listen to podcasts.
[00:09:23] Speaker A: Okay. And that's Texas.
[00:09:24] Speaker D: That's Texas.
[00:09:26] Speaker A: And so you gave out some numbers last night. So talk a little bit about like the number of families that you serve on a regular basis.
[00:09:33] Speaker D: So our food pantry, we serve. Roll it back to June of two years ago, we were serving 550 families every week. Every week.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: 550 families shopping. Shopping for their week's worth of groceries.
[00:09:48] Speaker D: For the week's worth of groceries.
[00:09:50] Speaker A: Every week.
[00:09:51] Speaker D: Every week.
[00:09:51] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:09:52] Speaker D: Roll it to October of 2025. We are serving up to 900 families a week.
Shopping every week. In the summer, in July, we were serving any. We was maxed out at 850 in September, we had to change it and open up some new shifts. And so that's why we are up to 900. So we serve 900 families a week. But we also, from the time school gets out until they go back, we feed Kids in the summertime on top of the parents being able to shop in the food pantry. And Last year was 600 kids. This year was 1,000 kids that we fed every day for 11 weeks.
1,000 kids.
[00:10:36] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh, that's a lot of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
[00:10:39] Speaker C: I could eat that many.
[00:10:41] Speaker A: Or whatever it is that you're serving.
[00:10:42] Speaker D: It was healthy meals.
[00:10:43] Speaker A: Okay?
[00:10:44] Speaker D: We prepackaged meals. And so on Monday, they would get these frozen prepackaged meals that you can microwave, but on Fridays, they would get two breakfast, two lunch, two snacks, and a vacation Bible school activity pack. So every day they had a meal, they had their lunch, but on the weekends, they had breakfast, lunch, and a snack.
[00:11:06] Speaker A: Wow, that's amazing.
[00:11:07] Speaker C: And tell them how you deliver it, I think. And it's the coolest thing.
[00:11:10] Speaker D: So a few years ago, we was gonna get rid of this program because the kids wouldn't come out to the sites. Now we do a doordash style, and so the parents sign up for their kids that they want to get lunch. And so we have volunteers that take it to their home. And so once we did that, our numbers came back up. And as I said, this year, we. We serve 1000 kids every day for their summer meal.
[00:11:36] Speaker A: So how many volunteers does that take to pull that off?
[00:11:39] Speaker D: We have a lot of volunteers. We are blessed and lucky that we partner with business, we partner with churches. But the one thing was, is that we have a lot of single parents. And the reason the number went up is because we have single parents. Unfortunately, everyone don't have daycare.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: Right.
[00:11:56] Speaker D: So that is one of the reason that we change is because when the parents sign up, they know their child is going to have someone to come to their door between this time frame and they're going to open the door.
We have amazing volunteers. Not only do we do that, we also deliver to some of our senior citizens.
[00:12:15] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:12:16] Speaker D: So on Mondays, most of the seniors come in, but we still have 15 to 20 seniors that cannot drive, don't want to get out. And so now we deliver their weekly groceries every week and their hot meal on Monday.
The rest of the seniors come in on Monday, and they shop the food pantry, they have a hot meal, they play bingo, but that's the only fellowship that they get. And then we give them a gas card or pay for their Uber or whatever it takes for them to make sure that they can come up and that they can fellowship.
[00:12:49] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:12:50] Speaker A: And so how big is your team?
[00:12:51] Speaker D: We have 31 associates, and then the rest are volunteers on an average base we have anywhere from 2,000 to 2,500 volunteers, active volunteers that run CCA. I always say we can't do anything.
[00:13:05] Speaker A: Hold on. So between 2000 and 2500 people that are volunteering, is that every month? Like, on a monthly rotation for the year?
[00:13:13] Speaker D: They're rotating throughout the year. So actively, we have anywhere from 2,000 to 2,500 volunteers that run CCA.
[00:13:21] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. That's really beautiful. So PGT, which is where I work, we are the largest private employer in Sarasota county, and we almost have 2,000 people that work for us, and we're the largest employer in our county. So you're saying you have more than that in volunteers for your organization. That's powerful.
[00:13:37] Speaker D: We do. Patricia was lucky enough that she was at the volunteer banquet, and one of the ladies, and she just asked me this today that she had met, and she said there was an older lady there that had volunteered. We have two staff members in our office that volunteer, and they've been there for 13 years. We have volunteers that has been there all the way up to 50 years. Whoa. That comes every week. Volunteer, do something. Still involved with cca.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: That's amazing.
[00:14:04] Speaker C: And they gave her an award at our banquet. And I was like, that's what I want to be when I'm 90 years old.
[00:14:11] Speaker C: Working in the food bank.
[00:14:12] Speaker A: That's amazing.
[00:14:13] Speaker C: Talking to people. And also, which I think is really cool, is that seniors have a lot of companions, which are dogs or cats.
CCA also give them, the seniors dog food or cat food so they can have a dog or a cat.
So that breaks my heart because I love animals. Sure.
[00:14:32] Speaker D: Well, technically, we do that with all of them. So our food pantry is not just food for the human. It is also food for the animals. And so we give out dog food weekly, cat food and kitty litter and hygiene products. These are some of the things that you don't think about, but they're so expensive, especially hygiene product. When you have a budget and you need to get some things, there's just so many things we forget about. But as Patricia said during COVID what we found out that our seniors was taking their food and giving it to their animals. We had a volunteer that came back and told us. And so now we have dog food, cat food, and kitty litter in our food pantry to make sure that they can feed their animal and then make sure they're taking care of themselves.
[00:15:16] Speaker A: Sure.
So if I don't live in Texas, which I don't, and I can't come and be one of the 2,500 strong volunteer team that you have. How can I find out more about your organization or make a contribution?
[00:15:29] Speaker D: So our website is ccahelpshelps.org again that is ccahelpsh e l p s.org on our website. There is opportunity to click on find out more about me by volunteer. If you ever in Texas, in Louisville, please come by. Our organization address is 200 South Mill Street, Louisville, TX 75057. Would love for you to come by and just see. And then the biggest thing that I would say that we need is prayer. Pray for the volunteers, pray for the families, and pray for the staff.
[00:16:06] Speaker A: Yeah, that's amazing. What great work you're doing and how much fun.
[00:16:09] Speaker C: And it's only like 15 minutes from our plant, so if you come and visit, we can go run over and see Sandra and see the great work they do.
[00:16:19] Speaker A: You know what?
[00:16:19] Speaker C: I would love that we can always put it out there and let you know. We do what we call a hygiene drive. We're like, let's change it up a bit. So we stopped doing a food drive and we're like, well, what do people need?
Razors, you know, toothbrushes, toothpaste, toilet paper. So one year we did a hygiene drive for them. And what we did is like, okay, we need to make a winner. We can't really. How many rolls of toilet paper did you do? So we actually counted, like, everything as one and gave our team, which was the receiving team, the prize we bought on pizza. But, you know, everyone thinks that food is what everyone needs.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Yeah, not always.
[00:16:58] Speaker C: You know, it's not always.
[00:16:59] Speaker A: Sometimes you just need toothpaste.
[00:17:01] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:17:01] Speaker A: And deodorant. You know, things like that.
[00:17:04] Speaker C: Especially homeless people, when you think about it, they just need toothpaste to brush their teeth or a toothbrush or toilet paper or all the essentials. A hairbrush.
[00:17:13] Speaker A: Yeah.
Amazing. Well, ladies, thank you so much for your time. Thanks for sitting down and sharing more about the organization. And what a fun day. And you guys got to do the 5050 raffle.
[00:17:24] Speaker C: It was a blast.
[00:17:25] Speaker A: And get to hang out with the suppliers. And we're going to get out of here. They're setting up casino night. And anyway, thank you so much.
[00:17:31] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:17:32] Speaker C: Thanks for having me.
[00:17:32] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:17:33] Speaker A: All right, take good care. All right.
[00:17:37] Speaker B: The Clear Impact podcast is brought to you by Mitre Brands University.
We are a part of Mitre Brands, a family of leading window and door brands united by our passion for quality and relentless pursuit of 100% at Mitre Brands. Our common purpose is to deliver value by manufacturing the finest products, services and customer experience every day, everywhere. Our window and door brands deliver regionalized expertise, products and services, all backed by a national company.
Mitre Brands University is here to educate you, our listener, so that you can be a more informed consumer of window and door products.
