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Cooperative Christian Ministries News Release • August 17, 2023 • M. Mericle
(Eden, NC) – Members of the Board of Directors and dedicated volunteers of Cooperative Christian Ministries (CCM) gathered at their Food Pantry location early Thursday morning to meet with Hank Henning, Local Government and Community Relations Manager of Duke Energy. Several months ago, CCM Secretary/Treasurer, Melissa Mericle, applied for a capacity grant from the Duke Energy Foundation’s Basic Needs Services Capacity Building program. CCM was notified in July that they had received a grant. Mr. Henning arrived Thursday morning and presented CCM with a check for $12,000.
“Cooperative Christian ministries is a long-standing non-profit in the Eden community. It was started almost 50 years ago as a cooperation between many of the local churches, to pool their resources and help feed the food insecure in the community,” said Ms. Mericle. “We have a dedicated group of volunteers, a generous group of church supporters, and many community supporters. We have kept our doors open all these years, and through the pandemic, with this support to feed our community, help with water bills, and help with electric bills, but we want to do more! With this grant, we plan to grow our operations, streamline our processes, and tell more people about our organization, so that we can help even more people. One of our first projects will be helping the children of our clients with school supplies and shoes for the new school year.”
After the presentation, the volunteers and board members had some refreshments and discussed ways to use the grant funds to further our mission, “Cooperative Christian Ministries is dedicated to improving the health and well-being of our community by providing access to healthy and nutritious foods, by providing emergency assistance for low-income households to access clean drinking water, and by providing emergency assistance for electric bills.”
“We are so grateful to receive this grant from Duke Energy Foundation,” said CCM president, Lynne Young. “This $12,000 will certainly help us increase our capacity to reach out to more needy people in our community.”
The CCM Food Pantry is open on Thursday mornings from 9:30 a.m. until 12:00 p.m. in the basement of Leaksville Moravian Church. You can access the parking lot for the pantry by the driveway that goes up the hill behind the Pack and Ship store at 952 Washington Street. For help with water bills in the Eden area, or help with Duke Energy bills anywhere in Rockingham County, call (336) 623-7214 and leave a message for our volunteers.
Photo courtesy of Cooperative Christian Ministries
Pictured in photo from left to right: Susan Moore, Bernie Young, Susan Scales, Mary Mark, Angela Hampton, Lynne Young (CCM President), Melissa Mericle (CCM Secretary/Treasurer), Hank Henning (Local Government and Community Relations Manager of Duke Energy) and Bill Smith (CCM Vice-President)
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