SARASOTA – Tampa Bay’s chapter of the national movement #HashtagLunchBag came down to the Suncoast to help feed the less fortunate. The service gives people in need lunch bags complete with messages of love.
“It’s really just to get people together in one place for a good cause,” Ariana Siller.
Siller is the co-organizer of #HashtagLunchBag Tampa Bay. She says this may be small gesture to some but it helps tremendously to those living on the streets.
“Just getting exposure to our community of the other people in our community that really could use our assistance in many ways,” said Siller.
Samantha Ponzillo has volunteered with the Tampa Bay chapter, but once moving to Sarasota she noticed the Suncoast didn’t have a chapter of their own.
“The first thing I noticed when I moved here last year was the insane amount of homeless people , and I am a bleeding heart from New York and I would always give anything I could when I had time to help others,” said Ponzillo.
A total of 120 bags filled with ham and cheese sandwiches, water, and cookies for desert were handed out along downtown Sarasota. Each bag also contained a hand written messages of hope.
“I wrote smile bright. I wrote that because you can like smile and you just want to be happy and jump up and down,” said Ellishah Whitmire. “And I wrote did you know God loves you and smile,” said Moriah Whitmire.
Ponzillo is in the process of creating the Sarasota chapter of #HashtagLunchBag and hopes to expand the service to surrounding counties.
