Magic City Neighbors Episode 14 - Cindy Bach - Helping Magic City Neighbors at Common Threads Closet

Nestled in the heart of Barberton, Ohio, lies Common Threads Closet, a non-profit organization that has been quietly weaving a tapestry of hope and compassion for those in need for over a decade. This remarkable group, run by a dedicated team of volunteers, provides essential clothing, household items, and toiletries to those in need, as well as meals and a pantry full of great food, transforming lives one thread at a time.

In this episode of the Magic City Neighbors on the Mic podcast, we delve into the inspiring story of Common Threads, uncovering the magic that happens within its welcoming walls. Josh and Jack interview Cindy Bach, a passionate volunteer and the leader of Common Threads who embodies the organization's spirit of selfless service.

Cindy shares heartwarming stories of how Common Threads Closet has made a profound impact on individuals and families facing tough times. She describes the joy of seeing someone's face light up as they find the perfect outfit or discover a household item they desperately need.

Common Threads Closet is more than just a place to acquire necessities; it's a sanctuary where individuals regain their dignity and sense of worth. Cindy emphasizes the importance of choice, allowing those in need to select items that reflect their personalities and preferences.

If helping those in need wasn't enough, Common Threads Closet also has an unwavering commitment to sustainability. Cindy explains how Common Threads meticulously sorts donations, ensuring that items are either reused, repurposed, or responsibly recycled. This dedication to environmental stewardship aligns perfectly with the organization's mission to care for both the community and the planet.

From a first person perspective, Cindy highlights the transformative power of volunteering and how listeners to get involved, whether it's sorting donations, assisting with food preparation, or simply spreading the word about Common Threads incredible work.

Common Threads is a beacon of hope in Barberton, a testament to the power of human compassion. Through its unwavering commitment to serving those in need, the organization has woven a tapestry of hope that strengthens the community, one thread at a time.

Visit the Common Threads website or social media pages to learn more about their mission and how you can get involved. Together, we can create a stronger, more compassionate community.

To watch the Barberton Community Foundation Game Changers video for more information, click on the link below:
https://youtu.be/JL4K2ACLF1I?si=APuxq7B3wLAXcnJV

Transcript

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So there are good days and there are bad days. And if you've had a few bad days or bad weeks even, there's a chance that you've been to common Threads closet here in Barberton to help make those days those times easier. Common threads were the other 2023 Barberton Community Foundation Game changer Winner. And for that reason we have Cindy back with us here today. Stay tuned. This is going to be a good one. You're listening. The Magic City neighbors on the mike, where we talk to your Barberton neighbors about their stories, their insights and what gets them laughing. Make sure to like, share and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And now to the show. hard times can hit anyone anywhere, any time. Which is why the sense of community and support for each other within brain is awesome. Common Threads is an awesome example of neighbors helping neighbors. I'd like to put a bad pun in here about magic neighbors in the city, but I've got nothing so Cindy, thank you for being here. We appreciate it. I know you stay fairly busy. I believe that would be as a touch of an understatement. Maybe I'm a busy person. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I want to dive right in with kind of what common threads is and what they do. So you said in the game, change your video, which we'll put a link to that in the description in that the number one thing that common threads supplies is hope. What's an example of how you guys do that and what it does for people? Well, for the people who come in to us sometimes they're really in destitute situations. You know, they may been evicted. And so what they have is a clothing on their back. It could be a situation where it is, you know, parents who just get their children back and don't have clothing for them. So they need to come in and get those. We have a lot of seniors that are taking care of grandchildren or great grandchildren. So all of a sudden they appear on their doorstep and they're in moments of, my gosh. So I think a lot of times when people come to us, they're like, my gosh, this is what I need now. I got this taken care of. Now I can see okay, and move on. And I think, you know, we've all been there or we all could be there depending on what goes on in our lives tomorrow, you know, So it does provide a lot of help. We do a lot of clothing, a lot of shoes, Lots of underwear. Really? Yeah. Interesting. Because you all you got to remember here, it's 9 hours. Do a load of laundry. So if you make $10 an hour, taxes come out. You're basically using one hourly wage to do a load of laundry day. Yeah, So think about that. So, I mean, we have a wonderful resource. Make more started after one of our conversations, Laundry Love Mike and Linda moore and that was great. But still you only get if you only have to do for loads. I mean, what are you going to do, right? You know, right. Jeans, probably undies, you know, so they can come and get underwear to us, you know, Are we always going to have the size of jeans I need? Maybe not. So, you know, that's where that kind of we feel those kind of moments where, okay, I'm low on something, how am I going to do this? And a lot of our folks, you know, they may be couch shopping. Sure. So you come in and what you're taking is what's on your back is where you're staying. You may not have any storage. So are you going to take your dirty clothes? Probably not. What you're going to take on your backpack because you got to carry everything you have and you own. You're probably going to take your clean stuff. So it's those it's taking care of that immediate issue that makes it so people can say, okay, that's one less thing on my list that I have to take care of, right? That household items, because maybe they've been eating out a lot because they didn't have a panda cook in Wow. Or you know, we do toiletries so there's that need or sometimes the fact of choice pantry because you you can get a lot of food in different places but you may not get the things that your family always truly eats. So by coming in and doing the choice pantry, you may get the things that you really want. And we try and do a lot of fresh vegetables, fruit. I saw that there was a ton of fruit, vegetables, the good stuff that's I mean, that is the thing that's missing for so many people because it's like one thing that I found is when you're in a tough situation, a lot of people just get calorie per dollar food, which is something like McDonald's or whatever, which it's calories. But is it good, right, to eat right? It may lead to other health problems which exacerbate other problems. Exactly. So how is common threads? I mean, you guys do a ton of stuff. How is it supported like financially, like the building? I mean, there's the times that I have gone through there to see, like, what's going on. I'm like, okay, this stuff just magically appeared or how does this work? Well, we have been blessed by the best, I'll tell you. Lakeview Church offers our space down below, and then we cover some incidental costs there. Okay? In exchange for our space, we get all of our clothing is pretty much donated unless someone specifically comes in to me and says, I have a check and I'd like to go to socks or like to have to go to underwear. And we have lots organizations like churches that'll do like under you and Sundays. Those are fun or, you know, size and Yeah, yeah, it's Saturday too. I think they should usually they just get us socks but they used to do a cycle. I could have a whole day of the week if I started Think t shirt Tuesday. Yeah that's right. That's yes. Every Sunday. So. my gosh. This. We are giving people ideas and that's important. Yes. I love it. So all of our toiletries just about come in there. There's some things that we have to purchase. But I mean, that's just common place because there's just things that don't people don't think to donate that we could always use. The food comes from the food bank primarily. We do have a lot of people who don't donate peanut butter to US breads. We get the day old bread from Giant Eagle. They are the best over there to us on Saturdays because they'll give us some donuts and things. One that's just good for our little volunteers. But also what's really important is we have many people who stay outside. Sure. So when they come in on Saturday and we just open, we always have a pot of coffee hot and then they can least get something in their belly until lunch gets served. And then when our lunch gets served at 1030, they can get the full meal. Wow. So, I mean, financially, how does that work? Is that donations? All donations? Wow. Yeah, we we have not had a fundraiser yet. Wow. I know, right. And how long has it been? Ten years. Wow. I know. Wow. So I guess I got to get serious about this pretty soon. It's. I mean, you're only ten years old. Well, I know it's a you're. I've learned way more than I ever thought I would, but that's that's interesting. So you guys, it's something that I saw that was unique as you guys get an insane amount of stuff donated that maybe can't be used. This is. Yes. But I don't want anybody to ever think, well, I'm not going to take it there. How we have set ourselves up is because over the years we've learned there's just some things that are not going to go for us. Let me give you a great example is sometimes we get China in and it has the gold rim on it. A lot of our people cook in microwaves because they may be in a situation where that's the only thing they have to cook. So they won't they just won't take it. But we have other organizations that we work with that'll be like, We'd love to have that. So Habitat for Humanity's has Happy Tails. They love getting that stuff. Great. I'll tell you what, I'll take your plastic stuff in exchange because we go through a lot of plastics over square like that. So you work with other charities to make sure that if you guys get something that you can't use, you find someone that can use it and be like, hey, let's let's absolutely, absolutely. That's exactly how this all works, because, one, we're not when we first started this, our mission was not only to take care of those in need, but also to make sure that we are not creating a landfill problem as well. Yeah, so our goal is to try and keep it around a bag of trash a week. Now, I got to tell you, since we started serving lunch, that is not a possibility, right? I mean, I get with it and I would love to eventually have like a composting thing or something like that that we could do and maybe a garden, but we have no space if you all showed us and how we have no space. But it's very cozy. I know, I know. I always called it my controlled chaos, but yeah, it's, you know, we try to make sure and like so if we get maybe some tennis shoes in that are a little more worn than what we would put out or then those might go to World Mission or and some other items because those are going to third world country. So they're going to go to Haiti. And that, you know, I mean, so that they can get use somewhere else, whereas I know a lot of places would be like, well, there we go. So there's lots and lots of things, worn flags. We deliver our water to VFW, they get taken care of appropriately. We take eyeglasses in, and those go to the Lions Club so that they can get redistributed Walkers, you know, crutches and those kinds of things get picked up by an organization called Joan's Friends. And she started this. She was in a wheelchair. And these all go to other countries because our medical supplies cannot be reused after they've been distributed. Okay. So, yeah, we do keep some on hand because we have people who come in for them all the time. Sure, sure. But we're always but once you have like 15 lockers, you're like doing might not need all that. Right. Right. You're not starting a walker museum. Trying not to though. If talk to Cindy Prather, she sometimes says we need to do something about this. Yeah. So she's some of the balance in this. yeah, she's okay. So if you haven't come down and met our volunteers, she's going to see that look on your face. you know, because I'll be like, Hey, look what they got. We got this magazine. She'll be like, okay, now let's get to go in here. And she gets off. Yeah, we all we have so many good people that are so cool. Yeah, because I saw that when I was filming there. It was an amazing group of people. Yeah, because everybody has an idea of like, okay, I think we can do this and I think we can do that. And you know, that's how you make it work. Yeah, Yeah, that's amazing. And how could someone volunteer for common threads? They just show up really? Well, absolutely. We're open on Thursdays from 4 to 7 Saturdays 10 to 1. But we have a couple of other, like evenings that we do some things, catch up work and that type of thing, and come out, see what we got going on, see if it's your thing. You know, some people might look at this and go, I don't know if I want to go through some donations, but maybe they're really good in the office or maybe they're really great cooks or they're a fantastic dishwasher. You know, there's always something that somebody can do and we do. I mean, I've talked about this so many times, is that we have got some people that can't be there to volunteer. Sure. You know, they have a really hard time being around crowds or health reasons. They can't be around crowds and that type of thing. So there are some things that they do for us at home. Untangle jewelry. Somebody will give us an entire ball of necklaces, you know, that came out of there. They look like Clark Griswold Christmas like, there we are. And I'm like, okay, you know what's great? They get that organized for us. Yeah. Wow. Can anyone volunteer? Is it? yeah, absolutely. We have churches, we have individuals, we have people that, you know, recently moved to the area that we're looking for a way to meet people.

We have people who work till five or 6: 12:56

00 and come the last hour. We have people who come weekly, monthly. They you know, every day we're open. So we have a variety and they can all different ages. I mean, young especially. I'm all about when young people want to come because if we show what serving is like to them, I think they'll continue to do that the rest of their lives. Yeah, that's really, really important to me. But every I mean, we've got we've got volunteers in their eighties. Wow. Yeah, that's really good. Who does coming out common threads help. Is it like mainly homeless or are there any programs to help homelessness? Well, we have a variety of different people who come in to us. They could be people who, yes, that are unhoused. We have people who come in to us that are couch hopping. So those folks come in. We have people who are families. We have families that have grown in size due to having to take maybe children from another family member in. We have seniors that maybe had to retire a little bit too early. We have several people who come to us because they have a spouse that has become very ill and they had to quit their job to take care of them. So there's lots of different reasons why people come to us and they come from all over. I think we have 22 zip codes that we serve. Wow. That come, you know, in part that's because we're on the bus line. So that's why and there aren't a lot of people who do what we do. So that's the other reason, too, is that you can go and get clothing, but sometimes it's given to you. You don't get to choose. And so this is a great option for that. We have organizations that bring people to us, so we have people who are doing home health care for people that will come and get items. We have people who are taking care of developmentally disabled that will either try and bring them to shop, which is sometimes very, very overwhelming. Sure. Or they will come and get the items they need and take it to them. So we work with that. We have an international welcome center. They bring families to us, refugee families that are coming in that need items that maybe or just recently housed and they didn't have curtains or they don't have some of the things that we would prefer to have in our home. Sure. They had in their home at one time that they don't have any longer because they've, you know, had to basically leave every. So you guys separate anything essentially that could be to good use absolute donations. We always take in household items, small appliances. I don't have room for a lot of furniture, but people will call us. And then I do a couple of different things. One, I always refer him to the furniture core furniture bank. They're awesome. Sometimes I'll even come and pick up for you if it's smaller items like a maybe a small table or chairs, something small, we can take that in. A lot of times it will connect people because on in our in common threads, there's a board that's called the wants and needs. I want to donate and I need to get and so we'll put things up there and then people will say, I want to get in touch with them. And we connect individuals with other individuals that have items. What's your favorite part about the whole common threads thing? If you could think of like one thing that he thinks your favorite part, this is going to be the tough question. Yeah, this might be the hardest one today. I got to tell you, Priya. I know, I know. It's our volunteers for sure. Because without them, the rest of this doesn't happen. It's like they bring the donations and they sort, they. They come up with crazy ideas of, like, what we can do with things. Unless they're very good at Google. And because we get things in that we just sometimes are like, I don't have a clue what this is. And, and you're like, that's what we learn. We have our blanket queen and Lori and she, you know, tapes, messages onto the blankets as she wraps them up, even their size. And then saw that now keep cozy you know which I mean is so cool So if and then they know when we're in need of something they will then get on the horn. You know, they're on Facebook, They talk to their churches, they talk to their friends. And the next thing you know, the items that we need are coming in the door. It's like, yeah, so this doesn't happen without all of them. I mean, yeah, pretty darn cool. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. I think on to the lightning Round now. no. And so, I mean, every guest has a difficult time with a lightning round, not because of the questions, but because we want short answers with the questions, and no one gives us short answers. So we'll see how well you do with this. You'll see the right. You could be the face. Yes. we're still working on that. Yeah. Yeah, we're. We're not really nervous about anything. Yeah, we're not real nervous about anyone winning the prize, so we haven't even figured one out yet. That being said, what is the number one thing needed for common threads during the holiday season Here? Socks and underwear, especially men's. Okay, that was especially men's. Actually, I had Take one. I take men's clothing. There you go. Perfect. Perfect. Makes sense. What is your favorite meal? That common threads is served. easy. Hands down. We did our cheesy grits with caramelized onions. You talked about an awesome. Yes. You talked about this before. And I was like, Yeah, we need to ask you about this one because you might need that recipe. Yeah, yeah. We we, we get very creative in our place. Can you for the listeners, could we maybe put that recipe in the show notes. Do you have the recipe. Well, sorta of kinda because you know, it's all right. It's kind of You told me it's lightning round. I'm only allowed to say one thing. No. Well, you got permission. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. We've. It's. This will not be used against me. No, it's this one that you still could win the prize. You won't, but you can. You get two cases of grits donated to you, and you got to figure out what to do with them. You get creative. I mean, to me, though, I think. I think that we had a large £20 thing of onions. I think we need to be able to help the listeners or viewers recreate this, though. If this I mean, this seems like this is a life changing meal to you. Well, I mean, where do you go for a free meal that you get something like that? No, I mean, it's it's amazing. We want to try this. We want to try this. Okay. I'll be happy to. So, yeah, that to me is the big one. Then you're up, Jack. What's yours now? That was mine. The favorite meal was mine. no, that was yours, wasn't it? Guys, Guys all over the place. I am. So what is the you mentioned you alluded to this with the Googling stuff. What is the weirdest thing that has been useful to common threads? How useful for this dump to her? That's the problem is when we get something you're like not been useful. Correct. So it's been interesting. I'm sure. I am sure there are a lot of interesting donations, but what's something that was and I was when I came up with this question, I was like, I want to be careful in my wording on this because I want to see what's been what's been useful, I think has some to. Jack. Well, well, well, well. Wait a minute now. We had a jewelry cabinet once donated to us, A big one. Wow. And that was so cool because we had one and it was great for just putting the jewelry in. Yeah. And then. But we need to be able to just the shelves, and we couldn't. And so now the one we have, we had just the shelves on it. And so we can put all our knives in and like sharp household items in there and stuff like that would be the most interesting. Yeah. Interesting, different. But okay, so can I get to the not that interesting but not so useful. Let's let's hear that one. We've had people's ashes being donated to us. We had it. Okay. So I know you're like, okay, but the thing about it was what do you do with those? Wow. Okay. Yeah, you find out. So okay, so I had a pastor because that's the first place I called was like, somebody's got to know, right? And I would think they would know. And they were like, well, maybe we could dump them and like. And which, by the way, is against the law, correct? I try and do that and just make everyone aware. That's all right, Grandma. That's a big no. That's your grandmother's trespassing. Yeah. She's like, so thank goodness someone came to their smarts. It was a volunteer who said, Perhaps we should call the funeral home. And that's a good call. We had a an outfit from the jail get donated to us. really? Yeah. Jumpsuit. Yeah. still got it Now we got rid of that. Yeah. Good call. Sadly so, what's your goal for Common Threads? Is that real? That's part of the lightning round. Yeah. Yeah, that's. I mean, I guess you're already pretty deep in your ten years, and you. You got it. You got it set up. There's got to be this one goal, this overreaching final goal. The final goal is it just goes on after me. Okay, perfect. I love it. You won. Congratulations. It's an empty water bottle with my chew gum in it. Here you go. I think she's going to pass on that now and still get that beautiful. Cause here's something you didn't know about us is that all of our water bottles that we use for our volunteers are washed. We put them through the dishwashing, and then this is what we buy. Gallons or, you know, get the gallons of shampoo. Sure. That's one of the things sometimes we have to buy because we don't get enough shampoo and conditioner. So you wash them and then put shampoo in those. Yeah. And what is great is our people who are unhoused don't like to carry the big gigantic bottles, right. That we get donated and stuff to them because they sometimes like these little small water bottles. Nice. That's awesome things I've taught you. I mean, to me, it's that very good, that resourcefulness, that that is amazing. I mean, it's that resourcefulness and repurpose. Repurpose. But repurposing. I am just failing miserably at speaking today. It's okay, bro. That. That's all right. Thank you. Thank you. That being said, we've got our every person questions that we need to ask of which, what is your favorite barber in folklore? Tall tale or rumor? And so am I allowed to say what we talked about earlier? Sure, yeah. The one about Lagana being bottomless. I'll say that only because I don't really know of any. I honestly didn't neither. And that's the only one that I had ever heard. And then I just started coming up. We've had some. Can you imagine the comments on this later on? Who is this lady? She recycles water bottles. And by the way, does she not know anything about it? I can just know because there are some people that I mean, there are some people that find that type of stuff interesting and there's other people that just blow straight through it and they're like, okay, whatever. So I get a question. Yeah, yeah. what do you see is the future for Britain and where do you think we're headed and what are some of the bright spots? my gosh, we've got so much good going on right on here. It's pretty cool. It is. I think so. I think one of the things that is the bright spot about Barberton is that this is a very generous and giving community agreed. And I just feel like that is one thing that is going to continue to prosper in this town because I think it's a generation old thing and I even find that sometimes the people that are really down and out that we help are coming back in some way to give to us. Wow. It's amazing to me how often times or like the families that we helped, you know, several years ago have come back and said, you changed my life. What can I do for you? And they'll step in and volunteer for a day and you're like, How cool is this? And so I think that I think some of the other bright things are is our sense community and our sense of that. Not all of us have to do it alone. Wow. Barberton nonprofit group is awesome about that. I mean, these are all churches, nonprofits that serve Barberton that are coming together. They meet first of the month. And, you know, so I don't feel like, okay, somebody needs help with rent. I'm not the one who has to do all of that. There's other people who can come to the table that are better suited to it, or there's like, you know, if a senior is at home and needs some like grab bars and those kinds of things, there's people who do those things. I mean, there's a lot of options out there and we don't have to take all of that on, nor does someone like, let's say, a church when they have somebody knock on their door, they have all these resources they can pull from to help people and help to help the families that are members of theirs, too. You know, because a lot of times that's where a lot of the beginning, the help for the beginning starts is that they are they mention it to somebody at church and then it goes from there. So it's that it's that in so many cases people need just that half a step up if they can get that that's that motivation that's that's called hope. Yeah that's very much what that what that was leading to. Yeah. To me this is it's an amazing resource for people that you've continued through Barberton and to me one of the reasons why I wanted to make sure we have gone to is because of the fact is it really does show the sense of community that Barberton has because you get so many people that are willing to help their neighbors, other people just pull stuff together. What you've done is amazing. You, the volunteers, everyone. When I was down there filming, it was, I mean, you said it's a little bit chaotic at It is, but everyone knows what they're doing and holy cow. Does a lot get done for those of you that are watching, listening, whatever, I encourage you to reach out to common threads closet, stop down, volunteer, donate whatever you can to do to help out, because as you said, some of us are only one or two steps away from needing help on our own. Yeah. That being said, thanks for coming on you guys. Thank you for having me. This was a lot of fun. Yeah, this definitely was a lot of fun. Make sure that you share this with all your Magic City neighbors and we'll see them next time. Yeah. Yeah, I think we'll see you next time. So, you guys.