People’s Credit Union closed all of its branches and its member service center on Thursday, Sept. 17, so employees could spend the day volunteering with organizations working on mental health across Rhode Island.
Staff logged more than 500 hours at more than a dozen nonprofits, schools and police departments, and an all-branch drive collected more than 500 items for children and teenagers in supportive care. It was the credit union’s third annual Day of Purpose.
“Mental health touches every family we serve, and too often it goes unspoken,” said Sean Daly, president and CEO. “We closed every branch, so our team could spend a day supporting the people who do this work year-round.”
On Aquidneck Island, volunteers assembled 200 hygiene kits and 200 sensory care kits for young patients at Newport Mental Health; unloaded nine pallets of food and served lunch to 60 people at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center; cleared more than 100 donation boxes at Lucy’s Hearth, which houses 15 families; and sorted 16 industrial bags of pet food at the Potter League.
At East Bay Community Action Program sites in Newport and elsewhere, volunteers set up staff appreciation meals for 120 behavioral health employees, painted 36 cards for clinicians to give patients, assembled 30 cleaning buckets for residential clients and redid reception areas.
Volunteers also weeded invasive species from the pollinator meadow at the AgInnovation Farm, built a relaxation room and playroom at Child & Family, ran fraud and scam workshops for seniors at the Portsmouth Senior Center and Anthony House, and traveled with Newport and Middletown community police officers and their comfort dogs to the Middletown Senior Center, the Jamestown Early Learning Center and the Potter League.
Elsewhere in the state, volunteers worked with the Jamestown Arts Center on a creative session for artists with developmental disabilities and MET School students, helped the Domestic Violence Resource Center of South County, staffed a table with the Narrow River Preservation Association, assisted adaptive yoga classes at Shri Yoga, and underwrote a Rachel’s Challenge anti-bullying presentation for 1,300 students at North Kingstown High School.
