Local

Onalaska Methodist Church shows Love-4-Luvs with diaper collection

Published

4 years ago

February 28, 2020

Trying to unload the burden on families in need, Onalaska youth are looking for diaper donations.

This is the second year of the Onalaska United Methodist Church’s Love-4-Luvs event. The church’s 7th-9th grade Sunday School classes will collect any brand of diapers until March 1 as well as gift cards and cash to buy diapers. Their goal is to get more than 7,000, but Paul Bratsch, director of youth programming, said that is conservative considering last year they gathered 13,000.

Photo Credit: Onalaska United Methodist Church (2019)

“It is so exciting for us to see them [the students] getting involved in helping make the community a better place,” Bratsch said.

The church says babies need up to 10 diapers a day, and that can cost families $80 a month.

“About one in three families in the U.S. can’t afford enough diapers for their children,” Bratsch said. “Sometimes parents have to miss work because they don’t have enough diapers to send their child to childcare. We just want to make people more aware of this cause, let them know that that this is a big need in our area and around the country. Anything that they can do to help is greatly appreciated.”

Donations can be dropped off at the Onalaska United Methodist Church (212 4th Ave. N, Onalaska). The sizes most in need are 3 through 6, but they will accept any size. The diapers will be given to the Hunger Task Force.

Kaitlyn Riley

Kaitlyn Riley’s passion for communications started on her family’s dairy farm in Gays Mills, Wis. Wanting to share agriculture’s story, she studied strategic communications and broadcast journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In college, she held officer positions with the Association of Women in Agriculture and Badger Dairy Club while volunteering as a news reporter for the college radio station. She also founded the university’s first agricultural radio talk show, AgChat. In her professional career, Kaitlyn has worked in radio, print and television news doing everything from covering local events to interviewing presidential candidates, and putting back on her barn boots to chat with farmers in the field. Today, Kaitlyn can be seen covering local stories that matter to you in the La Crosse area.