It's Friday afternoon, two weeks before Christmas and Mary Cremeans is knee-deep in Barbie dolls and Bob the Builder toys.

Boxes are everywhere. She and a small army of volunteers have spent the last few weeks sorting through the warehouse load of toys, stacking them into boxes and marking them with the names of the children who will get the playthings as Christmas presents, compliments of the Ironton City Welfare Mission.

Next week, the attention will turn to filling food baskets for the area's needy. Ask those who attend to the needs of the less fortunate and they will tell you the need within the community is real and painful. And while the holidays may draw attention to the plight of the needy, that need is there all year long.

Tis the season

"We served 655 families at Christmas time last year," the Rev. Jim Cremeans said. "I don't know how many we've signed up so far this year. We're still taking names."

After 37 years as pastor/ director of the Ironton City Welfare Mission, Cremeans has seen the face of poverty up close and personal, during the holidays and throughout the year.

The mission is one of a number of local churches and organizations that will hand out food baskets this holiday season. Cremeans will tell you that the requests for assistance at Christmas time and throughout the year grows annually. Cremeans said he hoped the goodness of others who are more fortunate will always keep pace with the calls for help.

"Donations are down 26 percent from last year," Cremeans said. "We heard from 18 percent more people but the donations were smaller. I just trust the good Lord to take care of us and He always does. He always provides. People help us through him."

This year the mission will hand out 3 1/2 tons of turkeys and potatoes, 7 tons of canned goods, plus bread and other items in each food basket.

Seventy-five percent of the food handed out is paid for through monetary donations to the mission. Approximately 25 percent is donated by various local groups.

In addition to the food, the mission will spend $10,000 on toys for 500-600 children.

While they don't assemble food baskets specific to the holidays, food pantries at other area churches are also busy.

Blocks away from the city mission, the doors are standing open at the First United Methodist Church Food Pantry. Members of the Lawrence Masonic Lodge No. 198 are carrying in dolly loads of canned goods.

Started in 1992, First United Methodist Church food pantry hands out food boxes three days week, all year long. But Director Colleen Massey said requests for help increase during the holiday season.

"We don't have the facilities to keep turkeys so (during the holidays) we give the same thing (as all year long)," Massey said. "We have seen quite a few new people lately, and they come from all over the county, not just Ironton."

Massey said the church started the food pantry in response to the number of requests it regularly received from people who needed help.

"It's amazing the people who come and the stories they have," Massey said.

Doug Elkins is familiar with those stories: as director of the food pantry at the Church of Christ in Ironton, he has heard them, too.

"I went out last Sunday with food for this family: a guy, and his wife and three kids. All they had to eat in the house was some canned carrots," Elkins said. "We're open two days a week, Tuesday and Thursday. But we get calls all the time. We get calls when people get burned out of their house. We get calls from school teachers who see problems and tell us about them."

At the Church of Christ, Elkins supervises a food pantry that now takes up four rooms of the church basement.

Like the Methodist Church, the Church of Christ does not have special holiday baskets, but rather hands out its regular food boxes to those who come for help. Like the Methodist church, the calls for assistance increase in the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

"We handed out 75 food boxes right before Thanksgiving last year," Elkins said.

Elkins said his church relies on donations from congregation members and their families, as well as

donations from the community. When the Kroger employees went on strike, the food store chain donated perishables to the food pantry there. They also get food from the Fairfield Food bank, which gets government commodities.

All year long

The city mission may well be known for its holiday giving, but Cremeans said the need is there 12 months a year and the mission is there to help. Cremeans said his mission assisted 1,842 families during all of 2002.

"The need is tremendous," Cremeans said. "They talk about how low the unemployment rate is, but if they counted the people whose benefits have already run out, I think the figure would be a lot higher. I think it would be about 25 percent. We've got more working poor now. They work and that's good but they're still poor. In my 37 years I haven't seen it get any better. When I first started (at the city mission) we used to just help 600 or 700 families."

Elkins agreed. "There is no work here, that's the biggest thing. Ironton Iron has gone out, Semet Solvay has gone out, and Allied Chemical, it's not there anymore. When I left the area in 1963 all of these plants were running. They're not here now."

Elkins estimated that his church hands out 11,000 to 14,000 pounds of food each month.

Massey said the Methodist church's food pantry handles approximately 350 requests for assistance per month, 2,035 requests for assistance during 2002.

"The first of the year it's reduced a bit but then toward the end of the year things pick up," Massey said. Referrals are made through the Community Action Organization, the Lawrence County Department of Jobs and Family Services or the Ironton Family Medical Center.

Massey said the Methodist church operates its pantry through donations from congregation members and local organizations, such as the Boy Scouts and the Ironton Co-Operative Club. The Methodist church also gets food from the River Cities Harvest and the West Virginia Food Bank, both in Huntington, W.Va.

"We have one Sunday a month when we ask church members to bring food donations or money," Massey said. "We don't sign up for (government) commodities because we don't have the room."

ighbor to neighbor

Elkins said he is grateful to those who donate to his church's food pantry. It is, after all, the generosity of neighbors that make it possible for the churches to help the needy.

"I know things are tight these days, especially for families. If people could see their way clear to donate even a little, anything we can get helps tremendously," Elkins said. "I'm proud to serve those need our help."