Optimist Club to hold Volunteer Day next week

By BRITTANY FHOLER
Cove Leader-Press 

The Copperas Cove Optimist Club will be holding their Volunteer Day next Wednesday, April 6, at the Optimist Club Thrift Store in the Cove Terrace Shopping Center. 
The club installed its new officers back in September, and they are trying to get more members and especially more volunteers to help at the thrift store. 
The new officers are President Linda Makinson, Treasurer Mary Diaz, Secretary Sheryl Wagner. Tanja Ridings is the store manager, and Rene Diaz is the Communications Liaison and store cashier. 
The funds raised through the Thrift Store go to various charitable efforts in the Copperas Cove community, as well as to cancer research, the Texas Children’s Hospital, and newly added to the list of charities this year is St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital. 
Pricing at the thrift store remains very low, with prices starting at 25 cents for paperback books, children’s books, VHS tapes, wash cloths, children’s clothes and all items with a pink tag. Adult clothing is 50 cents per item, and denim jeans are $1 per pair. 
Red tags are $5. Blue tags are $3. Green tags are $1. Black tags are 50 cents. Yellow tags are $2. Purple tags are $4, and brown tags are $10.
The Thrift Store has also begun offering a food pantry area, where people are welcome to come and donate non-perishable goods (canned fruit or vegetables, pasta, beans, rice, etc.) and customers are welcome to take what they need, at no cost. Ridings said they started offering this option last month after a customer asked if they sold any food. The pantry is located by the front entrance, on a set of three shelves. 
The Thrift Store is located at 332 Cove Terrace Shopping Center, and its hours of operation are Fridays and Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 
“We’re really trying to get more volunteers because right now, we’re still open two days a week,” Makinson said. “My dream is to be open four days a week, but there’s only six of us. We always have a day we come in and work when we’re not open, so that’s already three days a week. For us to do five days a week is just too much for the members, but if we could double our membership, then we could have two groups, and we’d be open four days.”
The Optimist Club’s Volunteer Day is scheduled for April 6, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Volunteers will work to pack up the store’s winter clothing and take it to storage and bring out the summer items, according to Makinson. There will be food and beverages available for volunteers as well. 
The Optimist Club has a new Facebook page, which can be found at https://www.facebook.com/covehelp. 
Their new website can be found at https://optimistcovethrift.godaddysites.com/.