CAPE NEDDICK - "He hangs, tags and prices clothing, he's shoveled snow, he's moved stuff - and he's a big fan of breaking down cardboard boxes!"
York Community Service Association Thrift Shop Manager Jon Werner was speaking appreciatively of the contributions of special education student T. C. Conlon, a junior at York High School, who's spending four hours a week this semester pitching in at the thrift shop as a participant in the JOBS program.
The York Independent's April 4 coverage of Conlon's presence there gave Werner and YCSA Family Services Director Lorna Ryan opportunities to speak about what each does - and to reveal how the importance of YCSA services is now growing as economic times toughen.
"Our mission is people helping people," Ryan said. "We're here for families and individuals, to keep them from completely going under," to provide assistance, that is, to people in desperate straits who don't qualify - sometimes simply because they're not poor enough - to get help elsewhere.
What that boils down to is emergency money, sometimes in voucher form, for such essentials as rent, heat, utilities, medicines, gas, food and clothing - and sometimes even a procedure like a tooth extraction.
The YCSA also assists York needy, directly and indirectly, in other ways: it now operates the York Food Pantry, distributing free food on a weekly basis; it fills and distributes substantial gift "baskets" - actually boxes - of food at Thanksgiving and Easter, 150 of them on each holiday; it provides, for free, medical equipment like walkers and commodes; it grants scholarships to York High School students, and it issues "camperships" to children.
Overseeing much of all this, Ryan clearly approaches her job with a passion.
"Sometimes people come in who are starving," she says, "a mother, for example, with three kids at home that she can't feed. ... I can't tell you how wonderful it is," she adds, "to be able to meet that need."
That need, and others like it, is now growing.
Last year, Ryan reported, the YCSA provided fuel assistance to 35 families. This year, it's provided fuel assistance to 39 families in just the last three months.
"Our budget for fuel assistance," Ryan said, "will be more than double last year's."
As she spoke in her office, her phone rang and she took yet another order. It was, she explained when she hung up, a request to receive some of the eight cords of firewood the York Water District had just announced it was donating to the cause.
"I've had tons of calls on this already," she said. "Help with fuel assistance has been huge this year."
It's expected that other needs may soon become "huge" as well, as the cost of fuel raises the prices of many other essentials.
Money for almost all of the help that the YCSA provides comes from its own thrift shop's proceeds. Some also comes in the form of cash contributions.
This nonprofit enterprise will be celebrating its 50th anniversary next year, and Ryan terms its commitment to local assistance unique, with the nearest such comparable setup no closer than Freeport.
Items donated to the shop for resale include everything from books and bric-a-brac to jewelry, kitchenware, bedding and furniture, with women's clothing, according to manager Jon Werner, being the shop's best seller. Werner is one of only five paid staff there, and the fact that the rest of the staff consists of 22 unpaid volunteers, some of whom, Werner says, have helped out for over 30 years, contributes mightily to hiking profits.
"This place would not exist without them," Werner says of those faithful.
Additionally, he notes, the shop serves several other functions: its nonprofit tax status means that it can issue tax receipts for tax-exempt donations; its low pricing means that it provides buyers with "great buys;" its function as a recycler of used goods means that it's shrinking the planet's accumulation of trash, and it regularly offers itself as a place where interested parties - Scouting groups, JOBS participants and others - can come to "do" community service.
The YCSA Thrift Shop experienced a devastating fire five years ago, but has since rebounded in spades, growing each year, says Werner, in both donations received and in sales.
"This place is amazing," he says, "in how much stuff comes in, and in how much stuff goes out."
And though, he adds, the shop is never lacking for donations - "not ever, ever, and that's a fantastic problem to have" - he encourages people uncertain about the value of an old item they're considering throwing away to "bring it here first.
Those items, he explains, sometimes turn out to be antiques.
"We'll take old cash, too," he adds with a laugh.
Recipients of help from the YCSA must be York residents. But, once that's determined, Ryan meets personally with each to review the situation at hand - and sometimes she's able to refer individuals to other agencies for sustained help.
"We work closely," she says in support of that fact, "with area churches, schools, town resources and other agencies to encourage a cooperative effort in supporting our community."
For more information about the YCSA, call Lorna Ryan at 363-5504. To learn more about the YCSA Thrift Shop, call 363- 2510.
