NK Fishline meets needs throughout

Published 10:00 am Saturday, December 2, 2006

POULSBO — While North End schools were closed during the first visit by Old Man Winter this week, a small group of volunteers braved the elements to help those in need.

After being closed earlier in the week, North Kitsap Fishline executive director Margie Addington and a handful of others found a way to keep the food bank’s doors open for at least a few hours Wednesday morning.

“People have been calling all morning to see if we’re going to be open,” Addington said. “We’re going to stay open for at least a few hours.”

With ice still on the roads, many clients cautiously walked to Fishline’s 3rd Avenue location to gather what they could before heading back into the frigid air.

“We’ve been very busy this morning,” she said.

The cold snap brought the North End’s often unseen homeless community to the food bank, she said.

The 2006 countywide homeless count showed that 755 people in 493 households reported themselves and their families as being homeless.

“We’ve been getting a lot of requests for sleeping bags and two-person tents,” she said.

Blankets and coats were also being distributed as Fishline did its part to help people stay warm, she said.

“I have a severe need for firewood, and I have a list of people requesting it,” she said.

Some of Fishline’s clients have received energy assistance from Kitsap Community Resources, but many depend on wood-burning appliances as their main sources of heat, Addington said.

As Fishline volunteer Kathy Smith busily restocked empty shelves and worked to make more food available to the midmorning rush, she said recent food drives and the success of Fishline’s Thanksgiving Day basket program made more food available after the holiday.

“We did more than 200 baskets out of Fishline and our sponsors helped us give out more than 400 total baskets,” she said.

None of the items in those baskets came from Fishline’s regular supplies, which then made them available for days like Wednesday, she said.

“A lot of the stuff we’re giving out right now was left over, and we’re doing what we can to help,” Smith said.