By Karen Gleason
The 830 Times
For some local families in need this year, Santa Claus didn’t wear his usual red and white suit, but the brown and tan uniform of the Val Verde County Sheriff’s Office.
More than 100 children in 40 different local families were served by this year’s Sheriff’s Office Santa (SOS) toy and clothing drive, an annual Christmas tradition carried out by the Val Verde County Sheriff’s Office and Val Verde County Sheriff Joe Frank Martinez.
In addition to toys, each child was provided with a needed item of clothing, whether it was a jacket, sweater, socks or mittens.
“There are several individuals in the office that were in charge of organizing this event. We went to the school district, and they provided (us with the names of) 40 families in need of assistance, and they got a list of all the children in those households,” Martinez said.
The sheriff said some money was left over from the previous year’s Sheriff’s Office Santa effort, funds donated to the sheriff’s office for that purpose.
“Due to COVID, we weren’t able to have our event last year, so we had some funds that were already available, and we also had additional funds donated by individuals and community organizations and groups for the Sheriff’s Office Santa,” Martinez said.
Martinez said two VVSO employees – Crystal De Luna and Crystal Denney – spearheaded this year’s effort.
The two women, Martinez said, organized all the shopping for the children in the families to be served.
“Each of the gifts for each family was put in a gift-wrapped box, and the gifts were left unwrapped, to allow the family to wrap them themselves for their kids, so they can feel like they took some ownership and provided for their kids,” Martinez said.
Some of the gift boxes containing Christmas presents were delivered to the families, and some of the families stopped by the sheriff’s office to pick up their boxes of gifts.
The sheriff said the SOS toy drive is an important holiday tradition at the VVSO.
“The Sheriff’s Office Santa program was started years ago by the late Lt. James Sunderland, who tragically lost his life in the mid-2000s, and it’s been an ongoing tradition ever since then. He saw fit that the less fortunate in our community receive something during the holiday season,” he said.
Martinez said each of the youngsters also received a reusable water bottle to carry with them to school.
One of the families, whose home was damaged in a recent fire, was also provided with everything needed for Christmas Day breakfast and lunch, the sheriff said.
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