School, helpers spread holiday cheer with turkeys for 400 student families

MT. STERLING, Ky. (WTVQ) – A school gives back to the families who have helped its staff get through a tough semester.

And Mount Sterling Elementary got some help spreading Christmas cheer from neighborhood partners. For the school’s staff and sponsors, the reasons were simple.

“Brooke and I live in this community and we work in this community and we want to always do everything we can to support, especially the children of the community because they are our future,” said State Farm agent Donna Payne, one of the sponsors for the evet.

“Most of us grew up in broken homes, I did, my mom worked every day to raise three grown men. She couldn’t always give us what we needed for Christmas or Thanksgiving. People like these guys here made sure we had something for dinner on Christmas, helped us with presents and stuff. Me being from a broken home and the rest of my guys wanted to give back to the community,” added Tubz Anderson, of the Mt. Sterling chapter of the Kentucky Highwaymen motorcycle group, which also helped put on the gift-giving.

“This year has been a difficult time for everybody and I think sometimes people tend to forget there are working people out there who are struggling as well so we wanted to do something nice at the holiday time for all our families, not just those who aren’t working but for everybody,” stated Catrec Garrett, who organized the giveaway for the school and deals with the issues family face almost daily as the school’s social worker.

The staff and sponsors handed out turkeys to most of the school’s 400 students in a drive-thru parade that featured plenty of Merry Christmas greetings and holiday cheer. The sponsors helped collect and pay for the gifts.

Other sponsors included the city, First Church of God, First Christian Church, Dubois Community Center, the Kiwanis Club, Walmart ad Kroger.