Noah was one of many Brighter Christmas inmates drumming up donations for the charity at the annual jail on the corner of Central Avenue and 10th Street on Wednesday, Dec. 5.
For over 30 years, Brighter Christmas has given food and toys to families in need during the Christmas season.
Brighter Christmas chairman Steve Abercrombie said the organization will help nearly 800 families and 2,000 children this year but donations have been slow coming in.
“Donations are very slow ... but the need is still there,” he said.
Wednesday morning, Abercrombie was overseeing the jail which had plastic pipes standing in as bars.
The jail was expected to house 27 community members during the day who take the role of inmates asking for bail donations.
Abercrombie was hoping to raise $20,000 with the jail this year, which would break last year’s total of $18,000.
“The jail usually does very well, but when the weather is bad, we don’t get the walk up traffic,” Abercrombie said.
Trying to chip away at his $180 bail, Noah took to the rain-dampened streets with a sign to raise the funds.
This was the 10th year Noah has been in the charity’s jail.
“It’s good helping Brighter Christmas make what they need to give back to the community,” he said.
While the list of inmates included police captains and business leaders, a five-year old girl was raking in the highest donations toward her bail amount.
Carly Abercrombie, daughter of Steve Abercrombie, was spending her sixth time behind bars. Her father set her bail at $4,000 and by 12:30 p.m. she had already brought in $6,100.
Between bites of doughnuts and yelling for help at passing cars, Carly said she was having fun in the jail.
“It’s good because I like getting kids toys, they be more happier," she said.
While Carly was raking in the cash, jail inmate Bill Kaska was struggling to get his bail amount.
“They wouldn’t tell me what it is but they started at a quarter,” he said.
Kaska taped a can to the pole and was passing it through the pipes toward cars on Central Avenue as he slowly worked on his bail amount.
The jail was scheduled to run from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Abercrombie said Brighter Christmas was also taking toy donations on Wednesday at Walmart located at 3010 W. Grant Line Road.
The charity will continue collecting food and toys through mid-December with the distribution scheduled for Sunday, Dec. 23.
To make a donation or more information http://www.tracybrighterchristmas.com/
• Contact Glenn Moore at 830-4252 or gmoore@tracypress.com
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