Calendar

Past Activity

St. Vinnies Greatest Hits

  • Start date: 05/09/2024

  • Start time: 9:00 AM

Description:

This will be a full day of touring the great community projects provided by St. Vincent de Paul, and will include a lot of walking and a short bus ride. It will be a wonderful opportunity to learn firsthand about all the services St. Vinnie's provides our community, and to meet some of the staff and volunteers who are doing this good work for all of us. Throughout the day, you'll find yourself saying, over and over again, "Wait, what?! St. Vinnie's does THAT too?"

We'll gather at First Place Family Center for introductions and a tour, then walk downtown, passing by, but not stopping at, several affordable, energy-efficient housing sites.

From downtown we'll take LTD bus #41 to the Lamb Building affordable housing site for a quick presentation, and walk to a Safe Sleep site for a tour.

After a late picnic lunch at MLK Jr. Park we'll tour the Cleveland St. warehouse and recycling center. We'll finish the day with optional retail therapy at St. Vinnie's at 888 Garfield and/or 1870 W. 11th.

You can either walk back to First Place Family Center (4.7 miles) or take the bus back (~ 45 min). Total mileage will be 11.1 miles if you walk back, and 6.4 miles if you take the bus back.

Note: You could also arrange a car shuttle for the return to First Place Family Center, by leaving a car at our last destination.

  • Event Leader: Carpenter Kathie

  • Assistant Leader:

  • Event category: Trips

  • Area Type: Urban

  • Departure Location:

  • Rating: Moderate

  • Roundtrip total drive miles:

  • Season: 2024

  • Permits Required:

  • Event Status: Passed

  • Supplies and Equipment Required: Shoes that are comfortable for walking on pavement! Lunch, snack, water. Sunscreen, hat, and/or parasol. Optional donation if you want to give one (not required.) $$ - LTD is free if you are an over-65 "honored rider," and $1.75 (exact change needed) for a single ride, unless you want to set up UMO Mobility electronic pay ahead of time https://www.ltd.org/umo-pass/

  • participant prerequisites:

  • Conditions:

  • Total Distance: 511

  • Member Fees: —

  • Elevation Gain:

  • Non-Member Fees: 2

  • Committee: Trips

  • Junior member fees: —

Trip Report

Your trivia questions for the day:
What year, and where, was the first St. Vincent de Paul founded?
How many countries do they currently serve?
What year, and where, was the first St. Vinnie's in the US?
When did St. Vinnie's first come to Lane County?

And, your bonus question: What is the largest non-profit human services provider in Lane County?

Answer: St. Vincent de Paul, of course, as eight civic-minded Obsidians found out one sunny day in May when we set off on a walking tour of nine different St. Vinnie's sites. We were treated to staff presentations and tours at the First Place Family Center, the Lamb Building Veterans' Services, the 410 Garfield Safe Sleep site and the Cleveland Warehouse and Recycling Center, and we also walked by several affordable & sustainable housing sites, tiptoeing so as not to disturb the residents. Highlights included:

• Seeing a mattress get eviscerated so all the parts could be recycled (St.V de P pioneered mattress recycling, and now mentors other nonprofits in how to do it.)
• Watching three refrigerator-sized bags of styrofoam get compressed into a recycling-ready lump no bigger than a breadbox (St. Vinnie's is the only place in Lane County where you can recycle styrofoam.)
• Peeking inside the tidy tent of a proud formerly unhoused man who now sleeps safe at 410 Garfield (They are doing a great job, but they have a wait list of 1600 people!)
• Stepping into a cozy closet lined floor-to-ceiling with stuffed animals, to be given as gifts to children from unhoused families, or even better, for these children to take as gifts to their friends' birthday parties so they don't need to feel left out because they have no gift to bring
• Hearing the director of Veterans' Services talk about the grants his office keeps getting in order to take care of "his guys."

In keeping with the spirit of urban hiking we, we ate our picnic lunch in a parking lot and rode the bus part of the way, but we still racked up 11 miles from start to finish. Even though the hike was educational, it was also really, really fun. We were so impressed by the breadth and the high quality of the services we learned about, as well as the pride and enthusiasm of all the St. Vinnies employees who hosted us.

Answers to first questions 1-4: 1833 in Paris; 150 countries; 1845 in St. Louis; 1954 in Lane County

Members & Guests signed-up & waitlisted

  • Number of spots on trip: 8
  • Number of spots available: 0
No. Status Full name Phone Transportation Needed? Trip Fee # Can Take?
1 Signed-Up Carpenter, Kathie 541-505-2370 N —
2 Signed-Up Marsonette, Vern 541-600-5332 N —
3 Signed-Up Whitfield, Nancy 541-520-0450 N —
4 Signed-Up Rice, Emily 541-517-0757 N —
5 Signed-Up Anson, Linda 541-228-8722 N —
6 Signed-Up Hanson, Vicky 541-683-7107- cell 541-954-5269 N —
7 Signed-Up Chan, Annie 541-223-2018 N —
8 Signed-Up Wolling, Sue 541-345-2110 N —