LYNN — The Lynn Police and Fire unions teamed up to donate 150 turkeys to the Salvation Army on Tuesday morning, which were later distributed to families in need for Thanksgiving.
Both unions, Lynn Firefighters Local 739 and the Lynn Police Association, split the $2,000 cost for the turkeys, which were purchased from PriceRite.
The turkeys went to families of four or more at the Salvation Army’s daily meal distribution site at Manning Field that afternoon, according to Capt. Helen Johnson, who runs the Salvation Army with her husband, Kevin.
“The community’s in need,” said Matthew Reddy, president of the Lynn firefighters union. “We’ve always (done) that work within the community. If someone’s in need, and we can help, we try to.”
The idea for the donation came about after the COVID-19 pandemic forced the fire department’s union to cancel its annual Thanksgiving luncheon at the Gregg Neighborhood House.
The O’Connor family — Lynn firefighter Mike O’Connor, his sister, Kelly, who is executive director of the Gregg House, and their parents, Kevin and Judy — started the Thanksgiving tradition at the after-school childcare center 34 years ago.
About 15 years ago, Mike O’Connor enlisted the help of the firefighters union to keep up with the growing demand of the annual luncheon. The union now runs the event, which aims to provide Gregg House kids with a traditional Thanksgiving dinner.
“Obviously with COVID we couldn’t do that this year at the Gregg House,” said Reddy. “We wanted to do something. We didn’t know what. Last week, we got a phone call that the Salvation Army was hurting for some things.”
Reddy had received a phone call from a city councilor, who told him that the Salvation Army was in need of donations, and he wanted to know if Lynn Police wanted to help, added Sgt. Tim Donovan, president of the Lynn Police Association.
“We do it all the time,” said Donovan. “Our guys gave $2,000 worth of turkeys on Monday to the Washington Street Baptist Church. That was donations that guys paid (for with) their own money and they’ve been doing it every year for at least 20-plus years. We basically put our money together and Matt went and got a bunch of turkeys from PriceRite.
“Police and fire do a lot of good in the community as far as giving back,” so the donation was no-brainer when the Salvation Army relayed that they were in desperate need of turkeys, Donovan said.
“We tried to buy as many as we could,” he said.
Johnson noted that the Salvation Army was also able to purchase turkeys for families this week with monetary donations made by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, LEO Inc., and Branch Church.
Only families with at least four members received a turkey on Monday and Tuesday, while families with three members received a gift card to purchase Thanksgiving food, Johnson said.
Between the two days, a little more than 1,000 turkeys and gift cards were distributed by the Salvation Army, which came from the donations made by the police and firefighters unions, along with the monetary donations made by those three other organizations, Johnson said.
“It was wonderful because yesterday we gave out a lot of turkeys as well,” said Johnson. “We thought we were done yesterday so to get more today was wonderful.”
