FRANKLIN COUNTY, Fla. (WMBB) —Now more than ever many families are struggling to buy school supplies for their children.
To help, the Franklin County Sheriffs office has hosted a school supply drive for years and even during the pandemic they continued their efforts to collect items for students and staff.
“We put these back to school drive boxes out so that if people want to go and buy some crayons or a composition book and buy an extra one, they can just drop it in the bin,” said Franklin County Sheriff, AJ Smith.
People were also able to donate financially if they didn’t have time to go to the local stores.
“We’ve had three or four different people that have made donations. I think the count we just had was $1600 to spend, so we’re going to go shopping for school supplies with it,” said Sheriff Smith.
The money was spent in its entirety. With 5 full shopping carts, the sheriff and his deputies bought all of the school supplies in sight.
“A lot of people may be having a hard time with the pandemic, jobs not being what they used to be, income not being what are used to be, so hopefully if we buy some school supplies for a child, then their parents can take the money they would’ve spent on that and buy something else,” said Sheriff Smith.
From backpacks, to pens and notepads, and even sanitizing equipment, the sheriffs office was able to purchase nearly everything on the school supply list.
The sheriffs office says they will be delivering the school supplies to the school district in the coming days.
