A special delivery – with love – is headed to the storm ravaged Houston area from some people in the Danville area. Joshua Edington, a Danville Police Officer, decided to drive some donations to the flood zone after his daughter – who lives there – posted some photos online. ‘’I happened to have the weekend off and I thought – well, you know what – maybe I’ll just throw some things together and I’ll drive down there and see if I can help for the weekend, and go from there,’’ said Edington during an interview with VermilionCountyFirst.com News.
‘’So I put out a message online about seven or eight o’clock last night, and my phone has literally not gone five minutes without buzzing since. We’ve got hundreds of people messaging, donating, wanting to bring something to send stuff along – and now we’ve got other people going with us. It’s pretty crazy, actually,’’ says Edington.
Edington (on right in ball cap) was commenting as people pulled up and made more donations on the Walmart parking lot. So what have people been donating for Edington’s trip south? ‘’A lot of water, we had a lot of clothes, personal hygiene products, kids toys, coloring books and crayons. Quaker donated us 6,000 Granola Bars. I have an entire box of Granola Bars over there. Big R South donated a whole pallet of water. A lot of money has come in,’’ says Edington.
Penny Antonini of Danville was helping load the supplies Wednesday evening. ‘’Our son’s good friends with Josh and has been since kindergarten,’’ says Antonini. ‘’And as soon as we saw that he was heading down to Houston we wanted to do what we could to help out. So I went around the neighborhood this morning and collected, and we came out shopping – and boxes and boxes of stuff later, here we are.’’
Antonini adds things really snowballed after Edington announced his plan to help some of the victims. ‘’It sure did! And people who didn’t have time – I’ve got a pocketful of money right now to give to Josh. People have been walking up and handing me fifties….it’s just been wonderful!’’
Edington lives in Bismarck and has been on the Danville Police force for nine-and-a-half years. He notes the people affected by the flooding are going to need help for an extended period of time. ‘’I heard this morning on the radio that the amount of rainfall is more than ever has come down – and nobody’s prepared for that. So, the losses that they’re taking – I’ve talked to my daughter’s mother and she said people that she works with have lost everything. And that’s something I can’t, like, just really sit by without wanting to help,’’ added Edington. Another Danville Police Officer, Mike Stevens, was traveling to Houston with Edington.
The vehicles making the trip south in Edington’s group include an RV pulling a trailer – both loaded with supplies, a truck pulling a trailer, and a pick-up truck that was fully loaded with large bags of dog food. Edington said he plans to give the money that was donated to his daughter so she can make sure it gets where it is needed.
