Remi Heyer and Nancy Smith with Steve and Susan Berlin. PHOTO BY MARY SCHENKEL

Volunteers spent a busy morning during a Community Day of Service at four different locations at the invitation of Temple Beth Shalom and coordinated by Remi Heyer. Now in her senior year at Vero Beach High School, Heyer has set her sights on attending NYU and hopes to become a civil rights lawyer.

“We started doing the Day of Service last year,” says Heyer, crediting Rabbi Michael Birnholz with the idea of organizing a mitzvah day, a day of good deeds. Heyer said that while members of the temple also participate in the United Way Day of Caring, this was just one more way to help those in need.

“It’s an interfaith event,” said Heyer. “Part of it being interfaith is that we all exchange cultures. We’re a diverse group of people, but we’re working together.”

Last year, they made some 500 hygiene kits for adults and children at the United Against Poverty UP Center. This year, groups of volunteers fanned out across the county to work on four projects.

At the UP Center, they put together more than 150 activity packs for children, wanting little ones to have something to do while their parents work with the UP staff.

At Temple Beth Shalom, volunteers were taught by Monica Bradley, founder of H2O (Homeless to Ownership), how to use recycled plastic bags to make comfortable waterproof mats with connected pillows for the homeless to sleep on.

Bradley founded the nonprofit in 2021 as a service project to assist the homeless. Plastic bags are made into strips and looped together into ‘plarn’ balls before being crocheted into mats. The mats are amazingly effective, if labor-intensive – it can take four to five eight-hour days to complete one mat.

“We have classes at the United Against Poverty building (UP Center) and that’s where we mostly give them out, but sometimes we take them to the Salvation Army to give out there,” Bradley explained. Mats can also be purchased from their website to use for camping or picnicking.

At First Baptist Church, other volunteers were being taught how to knit and crochet little stuffed animals for children. Some, Heyer said, would be distributed to the UP Center and others to various shelters.

The fourth project had volunteers harvesting fruits and vegetables at the Shining Light Garden, which will be given to local food pantries and soup kitchens.

“You can really change someone’s life by doing this,” said Heyer. “I’m someone who’s done community service for over four years in high school, but this is something that I found to be the most valuable to me. I genuinely enjoy helping people.”

Photos by Mary Schenkel