PCG-CRM Donates Care Packages to Military

December 2009—Everyone at PCG's Center for Resource Management (PCG-CRM) in Portsmouth, NH got into the spirit of the holiday this year-with enthusiasm. They had the opportunity to donate to Pease Greeters, a local organization that collects items for care packages for military personnel overseas. It was an overwhelming success. Collection boxes were filled with toiletry items, food items, and fun stuff. From socks to envelopes and notepads, twizzlers and tootsie rolls, crossword puzzles and playing cards, tissues, powders, wipes, hair bands, granola bars, and more-everyone brought items to drop in the boxes, and then brought more!

Pictured here at the PCG-CRM office are (L to R): Liz O'Toole, Elizabeth Chmielewski, Diane Stump, Nora Kelley; JoAnne Schottler, Coordinator of Troop Care Packages for the Pease Greeters; and Brianne Cloutier.

The office of PCG-CRM is located at Pease International Tradeport, the former Pease Air Force Base, and current home to the NH Air National Guard. Started in 2005, the Pease Greeters is a volunteer group that gathers at the Pease Air Terminal to meet and greet every military flight carrying personnel returning and heading overseas. Since the group's inception, they have not missed one flight. For those heading overseas, this is their last stop in the US. For those returning, the troops arrive on US soil to a boisterous welcome. Besides greeting military personnel, the greeters also send care packages overseas. They have shipped over 8,000 pounds of donated treats, hygiene, and fun items to our personnel in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Qatar, Germany, and Kosovo; and tee shirts to various military hospitals. For more information about Pease Greeters, please see their website http://www.peasegreeters.org/

Habitat for Humanity
Building Houses … Building Hope

Habitat brings families and communities in need together with volunteers and resources to build decent, affordable homes. The future homeowners participate in actual labor on the home, including painting, landscaping. Habitat houses are sold on a no-interest loan basis and house payments are recycled to build additional homes. Volunteers help these future homeowners bring their home to completion.

Our local chapter of Habitat for Humanity, Southeast New Hampshire Habitat, had a site in Farmington in need of construction assistance. The weather the first weekend in November was…invigorating. We were reminded to wear warm clothes as the buildings are not heated yet, and that it would be as cold inside as it is outside. But somehow that didn't matter. Our crew, which included PCG employees and family members, pitched in with painting, taping, spackling in one house, and laying shingles, installing interior walls and floors in another.