Northern Nevada Outreach Team

The Northern Nevada Outreach Team (NNOT) is out helping with the fight against HIV and HEP C. They go out twice a week and hand out safe sex kits, bleach kits and hygiene kits.  When the team is handing out these items, they are trying to make the city of Reno and the cities that surround Reno safer.

Today, they handed out condoms and bleach kits on Fourth Street in downtown Reno. The team also went to the homeless shelter. They make sure to try to help all those in need. They also try to clean up the streets from dirty and discarded syringes.

During their walk today they found six syringes behind a local bar in town. Luckily, they carry a sharps container with them so that they had a safe canister and could pick them up.  If no one removed them, then someone might try to use them, or a young child might accidentally step on them and hurt themself. This is one of the most dangerous ways for someone to get an STD/STI.

The Northern Nevada Outreach Team works with the Public Health Alliance for Syringe Access (PHASA) and they are trying to get a needle exchange program in Nevada legalized. This is going to be a tough thing to do since many people think that it would be promoting drug use. Our Outreach Team looks at it differently and we think we should be giving unused syringes away to keep all people safe and clean and hopefully free of the diseases that come long with sharing a needle. We all know that IDU’s should only use a syringe once, but some of them can’t afford to get clean ones, which causes them to use it again or even having to share them with someone else.

Kelly Penfold

“Shoes”

We all know what it is like to have a good pair of shoes or a few pairs of them.

What would we do when we need a pair?  Most of us can just go buy our shoes, but what would we do if one day we couldn’t?

While doing some outreach during the week, Jon and myself were looking for someone that needed a backpack we had made contact with before.  We could not find him, but instead came along a young man who had some really bad torn and tattered shoes on. They had no soles and you could see it just as he was walking. It was killing both of us to see him in need like that since we both are lucky enough to have more than one pair. I timidly walked up next to him and without looking in his face I kindly asked him what size of shoes he needed?  We were both caught off guard when he said he wears a size 15.

Well, after hearing this Jon said let us see what we can do. You see, however this fellow with the bad shoes had been to all the thrift stores and free places for shoes that he could go to. So, on our way home it was just eating at us and we knew that we had to try to do something for him.

Jon made a call to his mom in Washington to see if her “Souls from Heaven” might have a pair that she could send to us. She didn’t have any.  Next, he made some phone calls to other folks who might be able to help, but still no luck.  So we didn’t get off the bus at our stop. Instead, we went to Ross Dress for Less to see if they would be able to donate a pair of shoes, but no luck there. We told them why we were asking them for help, but they could not just give away shoes.

So we knew we had to keep trying to find some way of helping him out. When we got home I had put it on my Facebook page about what happened and what I was looking for. I also called a friend of ours and asked her if maybe someone in the church that she belongs to might wear the same sizes and she didn’t know of anyone. Before we got off the phone she said to me that even though she did not know of anyone who wore that size she would be willing to buy him a pair of shoes herself. So after the phone call to her, I called Ross Dress for Less back because they do carry the large sizes in shoes. 

Once again, I was able to talk to the store manager about the shoes and she did the most amazing thing for us when I told her someone was willing to purchase the shoes. She sold us the shoes for under $6.00!  We were just shocked.  I texted our friend back to let her know and on the next day when she brought us the money over she gave us more than what we needed. So we were able to not only buy the shoes, but we were also able to get some socks.

After we were able to get the shoes to him, he smiled and was so happy! He was telling everyone that he saw about us and the shoes he was just given. 

Just another way to “Pay it Forward.”

What we take for granted others may not be able to have or get.  So, remember when you see someone out there and they look sad or lonely try to say “HI” to them because some times that is all they need to smile.

Hey Team,

abigail@nnhopes.org