LIMA — On a breezy afternoon, several local members of Veterans of America Chapter 89 gathered outside the Fraternal Order of Eagles parking lot on Robb Avenue for a mission: Helping the area homeless by providing sleeping bags.
Their job was to unroll the bags and place them in rows on the pavement of the parking lot to apply a protective waterproof spray on each sleeping bag.
What made the project possible was another group of veterans — the Vietnam Veterans of America Chapter 732, a group of 34 inmates who are incarcerated at Allen Oakwood Correctional Institution. They made each sleeping bag from scraps of prison uniforms that would normally go to the landfill.
The inmates put at least eight to 10 hours of work into each bag. Along with the sleeping bags, prisoners also created duffel bags, personal carry bags, and gloves to be given out to the homeless through several different agencies.
Steve Montgomery of the Allen County Veterans Service Commission said, “It’s a great idea and a constructive way for the inmates to give back to the community while being incarcerated.”
Some of the inmates have even donated some of their own money to the project, which prisoners work on during their own time.
Other Ohio prisons are looking into the same project to possibly start at their prison. As of right now the inmates handle all the funding for the project
Each sleeping bag will be labeled before they are given out. The agencies that will be receiving the sleeping bags are: Allen County Sheriff’s Office, Lima Police Department, Lima Rescue Home, Red Cross, and the Veterans Food Pantry in Lima.
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