California Fire Victims will receive WtW Afghans

On Monday we received a request for support of Marine Corps families displaced by the ravaging fires near Camp Pendleton north of San Diego.  Nan immediately rose to the occasion and fielded a team of volunteers who sorted, packed and shipped out 154 lap afghans, baby afghans and quilts on Wednesday.  This is possible due to the continued support we receive from volunteers who help us keep the shelves stocked for our scheduled recipients and emergency needs like this one.  Sure made all of us feel good to send love to those families.

WHOA!!!!!!  We received the following response from Walter Reed, so please do not act on the recommendation we were given:

 Walter Reed only delivers mail addressed to a particular person.  For security reasons, mail addressed to Any Soldier, Any Wounded Serviceperson, A Recovering… will not be delivered.

Below is an excerpt from a letter to Senator Hatch from the Director of Information Management at Walter Reed:

“When we process unsolicited mail, we send an acknowledgment card stating we can no longer accept it and return the mail. We currently have a backlog of unsolicited mail and it may not have been processed yet. Department of Defense policy prohibits delivery of mail not specifically addressed by name; therefore, we must return mail addressed “Any Wounded Soldier” to its sender. Walter Reed has and continues to receive tens of thousands of cards and letters in support of our Wounded Soldiers and we simply do not have the resources to open and screen each letter before delivering it. Our focus is providing world class health care to our Wounded Warriors and to continue this program we literally have to direct our medical personnel from this task. “

If you’ve received this email, please advise your contacts to not send cards.  Too bad as it sounded like a good idea.

This week we also received an email suggesting that you add the following address to your Christmas card list this year.  Just think if everyone sent one card, no soldier would go without a personal card at Christmas.  Here’s the address we were given:

 A Recovering American Soldier

c/o Walter Reed Army Medical Center

6900 Georgia Avenue NW

Washington, DC  20307-5001