Facebook united a group of Santa Clarita residents outside of the virtual world and helped a local non-profit on Saturday night in Valencia.
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About 60 members of the Santa Clarita Community Facebook page raised about $800 and a few car loads of groceries to benefit the SCV Food Pantry at The Hyatt in Valencia.
“We wanted to host an in-person meet-up to allow group members to meet but we wanted to make it even more meaningful by selecting a local charity that helps those in need in our community,” said Julie Olsen, one of the page moderators.
Each guest was asked by page administrators Ethan Jewell, Julie Olsen, Stacy Fortner and Mike Cruz to bring a canned or dry food item to be donated to the SCV Food Pantry.
In addition multiple local businesses donated items for goodie bags and to be raffled off over the course of the event.
“We had many local businesses donate products and services that we packaged into gift baskets and raffled off throughout the evening,” said Olsen. “We even had two city councilmen come and do an impromptu auction for lunch with them.”
Santa Clarita City Council members Dante Acosta and TimBen Boydston made a spontaneous appearance and raffled themselves off to Teresa Wu for $300 and David Goss for $260.
Donations from around the city include 25 Score, Ben Oakley, Canyon Theater Guild, City Councilmen Dante Acosta and TimBen Boydston, Complete Pilates & Fitness, Elegant Editing by Melanie Grunwald, Gibbon Conservation Center, Gymnastics Unlimited, Halfway House Café, Honu Coffee, Insight 4D Ultrasound, JR’s Comedy Club, Julie Olsen, Pacific Pet Sitters, Pinot’s Palette, Popcornopolis, Speakeasy Bakery, Susan Wachter, Tastefully Simple, Consultant Holly York, Tribute Salon and Stylist Tonya and Trivia Parties.
Donated items and money will be dropped off at the Food Pantry this week.
This is the first of what the group hopes to make a semi-annual event.
“We will do another one this summer to benefit a nonprofit in town, we haven’t selected which organization yet,” said Olsen. “For the next one we hope to make it even bigger.”
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