Impact of Library’s Annual Hygiene Product Drive: Help to an Estimated 1,500 People 

Wednesday, January 18, 2023
Thanks, Kansas City, for stepping up.

You responded in record numbers to the annual hygiene product drive conducted by the Library’s AmeriCorps VISTA Project and Digital Corps in conjunction with Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Donated personal care items – from soap, shampoo, and deodorant to washcloths, combs, hairbrushes, and hand sanitizer – were packaged Tuesday, January 17, 2023 into nearly 1,100 kits to be distributed to individuals in the city who are unhoused.

Larger, non-travel-size items were forwarded to three local service agencies: True Light Family Resource Center, Neighbor2Neighbor, and Care Beyond the Boulevard.
 
hygiene kit assembly
hygiene kit assembly

All told, says Beccah Rendall, the Kansas City Public Library’s AmeriCorps programs manager, the donations will help some 1,500 people in need. That’s about 200 more than last year and the most in the four-year history of the project.

“Every year that we host the hygiene kit drive, I am heartened by the response,” Rendall says. “The Kansas City Public Library is truly blessed to be a part of a community that cares about its neighbors and supports one another.”

The Library solicited donations of travel-size personal care items from January 3-12, just in front of the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service commemorating the renowned civil rights leader on January 16. Joining AmeriCorps members from the Library in assembling the multi-product kits were the Unified Government of Wyandotte County, Della Lamb Community Services, and the State of Missouri Public Defender’s office in Kansas City. Individuals from the Kansas City Academy folded copies of the Library Street Sheet – a comprehensive listing of shelters, meal services, and health resources – to accompany the kits.
 
hygiene kit assembly
hygiene kit assembly