Casey’s raising money to help hungry kids

■ Store employees will be collecting money thoughout January to help students who run out of lunch money.

For the second year in a row, employees of the local Casey’s General Store will be collecting money to help make sure kids in the Siloam Springs School district don’t go hungry when they have a negative balance in their school meal accounts.

Money will be collected throughout the month of January with the hope of surpassing last year’s total of $1,800, according to cashier Robert Brown.

The employees’ first fundraiser for the school started in October 2017 as a joke about a broken Halloween spider and grew to focus on kids in need. Brown said a spider decorating the store for Halloween lost its leg. For fun, employees gave the spider a fork leg for a prosthesis and added a cup with a note that said “Please

donate to help me get a new leg.” Much to the employees’ surprise, customers started putting money in the cup, he said.

After some brainstorming, store employees decided to give the money to the Siloam Springs School District to be used for students who don’t have money in their accounts to pay for meals. In October 2017, they raised $500, then they planned another fundraiser for the school in January 2018, which raised $1,800.

Students are allowed to charge up to three meals, but after that they are given a sandwich, a milk and a fruit or vegetable, said Jason Carter, child nutrition director for the school district. The district also offers free and reduced priced lunches to qualifying students.

Carter said the donation from last year’s fundraiser was phenomenal, and had an especially big impact on middle school students. The donation from Casey’s employees sparked several anonymous donations to the school meal program.

“The awareness is fantastic, we appreciate it,” he said.

Casey’s corporate often holds fundraisers for organizations such as Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Muscular Dystrophy Association and Special Olympics, but the school lunch fundraiser is led by local employees and doesn’t involve the company, said Randie Toto, store manager. The store employees also held an independent fundraiser in August, gathering money, non-perishable food and letters for care packages to send to soldiers overseas.

The Siloam Springs Casey’s has also been very successful in supporting company-wide fundraisers. In September, the Siloam Springs store was awarded for being the top fundraiser in the state for the company’s campaign to support Special Olympics Arkansas the previous June.

The store is also going to be awarded on Jan. 11 for being the leading fundraiser in the company in the fundraising campaign for Hope For Warriors, in which the local store raised more than $7,000. Company CEO Terry Handley is expected to visit Siloam Springs to present the check for the entire company’s contribution to Hope for Warriors, Brown and Toto said.

Brown said he isn’t sure why employees step up to raise money for the community and also get involved in corporate fundraisers. He said the store has a good team that just likes to help.