Tampa International Airport donates unclaimed luggage to Hillsborough's 'Duffels of Dignity' program
'Duffels of Dignity' program aims to help foster kids
Thousands of children in the Tampa Bay area are in foster care or living in homeless shelters. A lot of those children don't have many belongings to call their own, which is why Tampa International Airport is helping Hillsborough County Children's Services give them "Duffels of Dignity." Kylie Jones reports.
TAMPA, Fla. - Hillsborough County and the Tampa International Airport are partnering to help provide backpacks, bags and luggage to children in need.
Hillsborough County created "Duffels of Dignity" to provide children in foster care or shelters with a bag to carry their belongings in.
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Recently, TPA donated unclaimed luggage to the program, in an effort to help the community and repurpose more unclaimed items from its Lost and Found Department.
The backstory:
Hillsborough County Children's Services started Duffels of Dignity a few years ago.
"It started with our family getting some new luggage for a trip, and the question came up with ‘what do we do with the old stuff?’" Craig Jewesak, the administrative service coordinator with Hillsborough County Children's Services, said.
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Jewesak said they couldn't find many options for donating luggage, but he thought about foster children who oftentimes don't have something to carry their belongings in when moving around.
"When a child is removed from a home, most of the times they leave very quickly, they're removed abruptly, and their personal items, their belongings are many times just taken in a trash bag," he said.
Jewesak said there are almost 2,000 children in foster care in Hillsborough County.
Over the last several years, he said they've collected almost 3,000 bags, backpacks and suitcases for children in need. He said the donations are distributed to different children's and family services organizations around the Tampa Bay area.
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A new ‘Duffels of Dignity’ partnership
Recently, TPA got on board with its own contribution to the program. The airport said thousands of bags and suitcases come through its Lost and Found Department every year.
"We get about 30,000 a year of items through Lost and Found," Dortresia Johnson, the guest experience manager with TPA's Lost and Found Department, said.
Johnson said those items include baggage, clothing, glasses, electronics, etc. A lot of those items are claimed, but some of them are not.
"Our main goal is truly to reunite the item, the lost item, with their rightful owner," she said. "My team works hard. We call them little detectives, because they're trying to get this item back to its owner."
If a lost item isn't claimed within 30 days, Johnson said they donate a lot of those items to other charitable organizations around the Tampa Bay area, including The Spring of Tampa Bay and the Pet Resource Center.
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Recently, the airport donated 119 unclaimed bags and suitcases to ‘Duffels of Dignity.’
"We're not trying to hold your items here, so, if your items are unclaimed, it still has a meaningful purpose," Johnson said. "It's going to the community."
TPA said it went through a process to get approved to participate in a partnership with ‘Duffels of Dignity,’ since it's a government agency. Johnsons said it's a partnership they're open to continuing in the future.
Local perspective:
The ‘Duffels of Dignity’ program welcomes donations from anyone in the community who's interested in getting involved.
"I think it was a great venture, one that I never considered before, but what a great idea," Sara Shevel, who lives in Hillsborough County said. "People leave things at the airport all the time, and if they can help somebody else, why not?"
Sheval and a friend heard about the donation from TPA, and wanted to get involved themselves.
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"Anything that would help somebody feel like their life was a little bit more normal than it obviously is right now," Sarah King, who lives in Hillsborough County, said.
Sheval and King donated backpacks and toiletries, like toothburshes, toothpaste and deodorant to Children's Services, after learning about the program.
"Children should have dignity," Shevel said. "All children should."
What you can do:
You can find more information about Duffels of Dignity through Hillsborough County here.
The Source: The information in this story was gathered by FOX 13's Kylie Jones.