Hats and Mittens program helps bring Christmas to disadvantaged children

St. Mark’s Hospital is trying to provide a bit of holiday warmth to children in need this winter.

They are collecting warm winter gear throughout the hospital for donation to The Road Home, a homeless shelter in Salt Lake City.

“Many of these kids don’t even know what Christmas is because they’ve never had Christmas,” said St. Mark’s Community Outreach Director and Road Home Board Member Sarah Kurrus.

This is the seventh year that St. Mark’s has made this commitment through its Hats and Mittens program.

“We started with hats and mittens but now accept all gently-used and new items,” Kurrus said.

The Road Home participates in a national program called Rapid Rehousing, in which families can receive housing placement assistance and supportive services, including short-term subsidies.

“The increase has been extraordinary. In fact, the weekend it snowed, they had 135 families to accommodate,” Kurrus said.

Providing warm winter gear is essential for children to attend school and participate in outdoor activities.

St. Mark’s will be collecting winter weather wear in three large bins throughout the facilities: one in the main lobby, one in the Women’s Center lobby and another in the cafeteria entrance.

“We used to string hats and mittens through the emergency room. Then one Monday, we came back to find that someone had taken all mittens,” Kurrus said.

Because of this incident, the hospital is asking that all items have the tags removed.

“If someone needs the mittens, well, that’s one thing. But we don’t want them trying to return them to a store,” Kurrus said.

This is also why the hospital now uses large bins to collect the donations, instead of the festive mitten strings that used to decorate the emergency room in past years.

St. Mark’s receives donations from employees and the general public.

“Our employees bring in a lot. Or someone who’s had a spouse die might bring in their warm coats,” Kurrus said.

One knitting group is part of a veteran’s association, and they get together to knit hats in memory of fallen soldiers.

The hospital is taking donations until Dec. 21 when they will be delivering the supplies to The Road Home during its radio-thon.

The radio-thon on Dec. 20 and 21 will include nine local stations that broadcast live from the Salt Lake shelter to encourage listeners to support The Road Home.