{"id":51269,"date":"2013-11-20T00:02:41","date_gmt":"2013-11-19T14:02:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?p=51269"},"modified":"2020-12-11T10:47:48","modified_gmt":"2020-12-11T00:47:48","slug":"unitingcare-sets-christmas-target","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/","title":{"rendered":"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Playing Santa this Christmas … from left, Target employees Michelle Witkowski and Brooke Darr; \u00a0UnitingCare program manager Sarah Franciosa-Jones, Sue Mortimer (Uniting Church), \u00a0Mia Thompson (Target) and store manager Amanda Parnell\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

November 20, 2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

Christmas is getting closer, which means the demand on local family support services is also getting more urgent.<\/p>\n

UnitingCare has joined forces with the Target Country store in Kingaroy to provide shoppers with an easy way to help South Burnett families this Christmas.<\/p>\n

The store, located in the SupaIGA carpark, is erecting a special Christmas Tree as part of “Operation Santa”.<\/p>\n

Shoppers can take a gift tag from the tree and donate a gift for someone in need. They can also donate a gift card by selecting a dollar amount tag from the tree and taking it to the cash register.<\/p>\n

UnitingCare Program Manager for South Burnett Services Sarah Franciosa-Jones said UnitingCare would allocate the presents to families, wrap them and then distribute them.<\/p>\n

The group operates several local programs, including a Women’s Refuge and a safe house. It also handles referrals for assistance and runs a family support program.<\/p>\n

“Currently we probably have up to 60 families that we are working with,” Sarah said.<\/p>\n

“And we have up to 12 families at any one time in the refuges.”<\/p>\n

She said most were women who had been targets of domestic violence or were at risk of homelessness.<\/p>\n

UnitingCare is also running a community recovery program which is supporting families which were affected by the floods earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Sarah said there were 30 families who were currently having ongoing support.<\/p>\n

However the group had also been working on a four-month project to reach out to more rural families.<\/p>\n

“In October, we door-knocked 245 families to see if they needed ongoing support,” she said.<\/p>\n

Many needed assistance but had no idea where to turn to, despite all the publicity from local agencies, the State Government and local councils.<\/p>\n

“We found people who didn’t know there was any assistance available,” Sarah said.<\/p>\n

Operation Santa local co-ordinator Susan Mortimer, from the Uniting Church, said this was the fourth year that Target Country in Kingaroy had run the project in conjunction with UnitingCare.<\/p>\n

Across Australia, the program has been running for 22 years. This year UnitingCare and Target are aiming to collect 100,000 gifts and $200,000 in gift cards nationwide to assist about 60,000 families.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Christmas is getting closer, which means the demand on local family support services is also getting more urgent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":51273,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,16,3],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nUnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Christmas is getting closer, which means the demand on local family support services is also getting more urgent.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"southburnett.com.au\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-11-19T14:02:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-12-11T00:47:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/20131118target.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"620\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"385\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Anne Miller\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Anne Miller\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/\",\"name\":\"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-11-19T14:02:41+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-12-11T00:47:48+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#\/schema\/person\/d43a5027bdddc95f54e9c6274d8a57ae\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-AU\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/\",\"name\":\"southburnett.com.au\",\"description\":\"Kingaroy and South Burnett News\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-AU\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#\/schema\/person\/d43a5027bdddc95f54e9c6274d8a57ae\",\"name\":\"Anne Miller\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/author\/anne-miller\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au","og_description":"Christmas is getting closer, which means the demand on local family support services is also getting more urgent.","og_url":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/","og_site_name":"southburnett.com.au","article_published_time":"2013-11-19T14:02:41+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-12-11T00:47:48+00:00","og_image":[{"width":"620","height":"385","url":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/20131118target.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Anne Miller","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Anne Miller","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/","url":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/","name":"UnitingCare Sets Christmas Target - southburnett.com.au","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-11-19T14:02:41+00:00","dateModified":"2020-12-11T00:47:48+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#\/schema\/person\/d43a5027bdddc95f54e9c6274d8a57ae"},"inLanguage":"en-AU","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2013\/11\/20\/unitingcare-sets-christmas-target\/"]}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#website","url":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/","name":"southburnett.com.au","description":"Kingaroy and South Burnett News","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-AU"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/#\/schema\/person\/d43a5027bdddc95f54e9c6274d8a57ae","name":"Anne Miller","url":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/author\/anne-miller\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51269"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51269"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":289721,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51269\/revisions\/289721"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}