On December 27, 2005, in late afternoon, there was a house fire in the 100 Block of West 8 Street. As she was leaving to run an errand, Amanda Sandoval thought that she had turned the burner off on the stove. Accidentally, the burner was set to “high.” She had been sterilizing baby bottles / “sippie” cups. Fire damage was confined to the kitchen area of the house owned by Max Towell. However, there was some heat damage and extensive smoke damage to the remainder of the residence.
Amanda lived in the residence with her significant other, Andre Franklin, and their three children; Matthew, age 3; Crystal, age 2; and Benjamin, age 1.
One of the activities of the Keith County Citizen Corps is to work to help families who experience a house fire. Our organization has provided them with 2 weeks of temporary housing at the Plaza Inn; a roll off from Waste Management for disposing of unsalvageable items; a storage unit at Westside Storage through February; several plastic totes to store clothing and supplies; and quarters for many loads of laundry at the local Laundromat (fortunately, most of their clothing cleaned nicely.) Bruce Jensen of ServiceMaster volunteered his time to give them advice on how to clean some of their personal contents and told them what furnishings and contents could not be cleaned due to the smoke/heat damage. Most of the furniture is not salvageable. Citizen Corps is planning to have Bruce attempt to clean several small family heirlooms.
Amanda and Andre have found a home to rent in Ogallala from Dayton Armstrong and will soon be moving in. They have need for many items to get re-settled. If you have, or know of someone who might have, any of the following items in useable condition either as a donation or at low cost, please contact me at 308.289.0155. If you would be interested in a monetary donation, checks would need to be payable to Keith County Citizen Corps. Our organization never provides direct assistance in the form of cash. We convert cash into items that are needed by the families that need our support.
Furniture
Sofa / Loveseat
Entertainment Center
Lamps and end tables
Sofa bed or 3 children’s beds
Adult bedroom set
2 dressers
Kitchen table/chairs
Electrical Appliances
Television
VCR
Vacuum Cleaner
Microwave Oven
Toaster
Other Items
Bedding
Curtains/Curtain rods
Throw rugs
Picture frames
Kitchen items – everything from spoons to pots/pans to dish rags to dish soap
Trash cans
Stuffed animals - toys