Thousands in Utah recognize 9/11 with Day of Service
Sep 11, 2024, 9:24 PM | Updated: Sep 12, 2024, 12:08 am
SOUTH JORDAN — Thousands of people across Utah recognized 9/11 Wednesday by helping in the National Day of Service.
In South Jordan, the Country Park Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was one of several church groups that organized volunteer events for the day.
Just off Redwood Road and 11400 South, nearly a 1,000 people gathered to help assemble school kits for children in Zimbabwe, shared art for boxes that will be filled with food for local food pantries, and donated supplies for local refugees and the Ronald McDonald House.
Tracy Wagstaff and Darlene Stoker started planning this event, which also included a dinner of pulled pork sandwiches, in June.
“Service is so heartwarming,” Stoker said. ” It’s almost like this adrenaline rush that you just feel like that feels so good to help; I can’t stop helping, that’s my favorite thing about it.”
Others feel the same. Avery Hurst was there with her grandparents.
“I have this warm, bubbly feeling inside,” Hurst said about the service project. She’s helping fill 900 lunchboxes with school supplies. The kits will eventually be shipped overseas to those kids. Everything here was donated by church and community members.
People also filled trucks with hygiene kits, clothes, blankets, food and toys for St. Andrews Food Pantry in South Jordan, Serve Refugees in the Salt Lake Valley, The Utah Food Bank and the Ronald McDonald Houses in Salt Lake City and Lehi.
“I’ve just been so overwhelmed with gratitude for the donations,” Tracy Wagstaff said. “They’ve come from single women and widows and from wards and families, and just all different kinds of people have pitched in to provide us the products to go into these things.”
The National Day of Service was created in 2009. It’s now estimated that 35 million Americans participate in some kind of service on this day.
