The sun has been shining brightly and with daylight savings time going into effect, quite a few people have begun their spring cleaning. The number of emails asking if the Santa Monica Pacific Palisades (SMPP) Lions Club takes used eyeglasses, has increased as it does each spring.
Ever since Helen Keller inspired Lions Clubs International (LCI) and challenged us "to become knights of the blind" in 1925, we’ve helped combat vision impairment and blindness. With this same conviction, Lions have also been dedicated to providing medical care and education to help prevent hearing loss.
The way our SMPP Lions Club contributes to LCI goals is through our collection of gently used eyeglasses, sunglasses, eyeglass cases and used hearing aids. With nine drop-off locations throughout Santa Monica and the Pacific Palisades, we are happy you want to help thousands of people throughout, Southern California, Mexico and the Philippines experience better vision. You can always find our latest drop off locations by clicking here.
All eyeglasses we collect are taken to a facility in Banning where Lions volunteers clean, repair, sort by refraction, and package them to be distributed and shipped to their final destinations. The hearing aids are also cleaned, given new batteries and sorted and shipped as well.
Coming up next for the SMPP Lions is the annual Arts & Literacy Festival at Virginia Avenue Park, on Saturday, April 27th from 10am–2pm. With the theme, The Robots Are Here, we will be helping preschool age children assemble simple robots. You can join our volunteers for a three hour shift in the morning or afternoon, just let us know by sending an email here. This is a great chance for middle and high school students to earn community service hours, helping children with craft projects and handing out stickers.
Our new meeting schedule continues with monthly dinner meetings on the 4th Wednesday of each month for March, April, and May. All meetings continue to be at 6pm and are held at the SM Elks Lodge. If you are interested in possibly becoming a member or joining us in any of our community activities, please contact Kingsley at 310-454-2960 or by email. You can also learn more about us from our website.
Submitted by Susan DeRemer
