Santa will be blue on December 16, but not because he is sad or cold. The Levelland Police Department’s “Blue & You” organization will host its 3rd Annual Blue Santa Christmas shopping event for kids on Saturday, December 16.
“We are excited to team up with Love Levelland to provide a great Christmas for 29 kids in Levelland,” said Police Chief, Albert Garcia. “Love Levelland has taken the lead role for families in need of assistance for the holidays, and once they gave us information on our 29 kids, we got to work!”
The 29 children come from 17 families. Those families will also receive meal vouchers from “Blue & You” through United Supermarket.
Blue Santa is a community outreach program where uniformed Levelland Police Officers pick up the kids from their homes, take them to McDonalds for breakfast, then whisk them off to Walmart for a Christmas shopping spree. In its third year, the event has grown each year.
“We adopted 19 kids last year, and are able to adopt 29 this year,” said Garcia.
“Blue & You” is a 501-C3 non-profit organization that raises money throughout the year to fund community outreach activities, like National Night Out and Blue Santa.
“We held a Rag Ball tournament in the summer to raise funds for this event. Bill Cohen from McDonalds has once again offered to provide breakfast for our kids and officers. Then, in the last few weeks, our friends from Plains Motor Supply, several private citizens and a local church group dropped off money specifically for this special event. To say we are blessed is an understatement,” said Garcia.
Event organizers want to make the public aware of the event.
“During our first Blue Santa event, we unintentionally caused concern due to the large presence of law enforcement at McDonalds and Walmart.” said Garcia. “So, we want to make sure that going forward, we let everyone know that if they see a long line of police cars with lights and sirens early that Saturday morning, or if they see a parking lot full of police cars at McDonalds or Walmart, that those cars are simply substituting for Santa’s sleigh.”