I can understand concerns in trying to help our needy children with toys during Christmas and not being able to solicit funds from the traffic in the streets. We have been doing it for years and no one has been hurt yet. Veterans Helping Veterans and Others not only helps the needy during Christmas, but year round we have homeless, needy veterans and other who come to us for a helping hand. Ohio 139 at US 52 in New Boston is where we received most of our donations until we were stopped for some reason. We have sent letters, visited the village council meetings and have made several stops trying to get permission. We have gone to the City of Portsmouth to get a permit and were told that it was against the law.

Mayor Warren of New Boston paid a visit to our food pantry and he fell in love with what he saw, in fact he liked what he saw so much that he joined our organization that day. You can see his visit on our web site at www.veteranshelping.org. We live in an area that is listed as number two on the poverty list in the State of Ohio. Thousands of jobs have been lost and the President-elect said things were going to get even worse before it got better.

Though we live in a poverty-stricken area the good people of Scioto County still give to help the needy. They don't mind giving a few bucks or a handful of change to help feed our homeless, needy veterans and others. We were doing fine in the streets until we were stopped, then we had to close a few times. We have shut-ins in the community who depend on our food pantry to help them finish out the month. Their providers from Home Health Care pick up the food for them each month, when we have it. We were even forced to stop giving out personal hygiene items and baby needs because of it.

We are living in hard times. Our city officials should be behind programs like ours in the area that is helping the needy. It is a terrible feeling to see our veterans, the elderly and our children standing in our pantry line and having to close because we run out of food. Granted, there are those who stand on the streets to help themselves instead of others. There should be a file kept on hand of the 501c3 organizations. This way they can be checked out. Thank you for bringing this up. I don't think our leaders understood the hardships they were causing our needy children this Christmas and those who go without food in our area throughout the year.

John D. Foster

Commander - V.H.V.O.

Editor's note: New Boston did approve the Bikers for Charity's request after this letter was received and collectors will be on hand Saturday for the fundraiser, so please support this and other local causes for the needy.