http://www.thebattlecreekshopper.com BATTLE CREEK SHOPPER NEWS Thursday, August 29, 2024 9
PARADE
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The Reminder“Over the past three years since
my husband and I have taken
over chairing the parade, we
have certainly seen community
engagement is on an up-tick,” said
Cornish, “and we want to ensure
we are able to have as many
groups join us as possible.”
Stephanie Cornish continues as
Christmas Parade Coordinator,
following in the footsteps of her
dad Jim Demarest who was the
coordinator until his death in
2020.“I know my dad continues
watching over us throughout the
planning process, and I know he
would be proud to see the commu-
nity coming together and showing
others that Battle Creek is great,”
she said. “There are some many
local groups working together
to make Battle Creek have some
amazing events, ones that I
remember from my childhood
years here.”
The Parade kicks off at the
corner of Champion Street and
Washington Avenue at 5:45 p.m.,
with arrival downtown on East
Michigan Avenue at 6 p.m.Local ministry puts free cars
into the hands of the needy
Joleen and Brian Robins, from the
Rings Ministries Organization, Battle
Creek, Michigan. (Shopper News photo by
Lane Isaacs)LANE ISAACS
Shopper News Contributor
Battle Creek and its surrounding
communities have a special program
of which many may not be aware.
The main objective of Rings
Ministries is to match needy, work-
ing, vehicle-less, low-income resi-
dents with a special gift: a donated
car to help them on their difficult
path.
The program, started and man-
aged by Brian and Joleen Robins five
years ago, strives to match individu-
als in need of a vehicle to be given,
free of charge, to them after certain
criteria are met.
“We really try and cater to the
‘working poor’ so they can get to
and from work in a safe and reliable
vehicle,” Robins stated. “We started
this program when we knew of a sin-
gle-working mother that was walking
to and from work and also to and
from her child’s daycare, ‘picking
up’ the child, on foot. Since I’m
in the purchasing field at Sunshine
Toyota, this gave us an idea of how
we could help our community in a
way that wasn’t being serviced here
in town.”
The Robins’ church family at
Woodland Church and at St. Mark’s,
along with Sunshine Toyota, were
instrumental with being involved in
fundraising efforts and with a place
for Robins, and their team of vol-
unteers, to work on and service the
vehicles.
“The volunteers and people we
have around us that help with these
vehicles is just amazing,” he said.
“We get cars donated to us or we’ll
go and pick something up just to end
up fixing what it needs and getting it
ready to be donated.”
Robins explained that, at
times, people will donate something
either too nice or expensive to main-
tain to something that is beyond
safely repairing.
“We had a gentleman donate a
Jaguar and we just couldn’t justify
donating a vehicle that would end
up incurring too much of an expenseSee FREE CAR on 10