CAPE MAY– For Petty Officer Second Class Jennifer Bull, this year is her first Christmas at home, and having a real Christmas tree meant so much to her that she was first in line Friday when the Coast Guard Training Center received 50 donated trees as part of Trees for Troops.
“It means alot to have my first Christmas at my home base,” Bull said. Originally from Hawaii, she has been stationed at Cape May for over three years. “I’ve been on assignment the other years, so this year is really special.”
For Chelsea and Douglas Helkowski, it’s not only their first Christmas at the base, it’s their first Christmas as a married couple.
“It’s a great program recognizing our service,” Chelsea said about Trees for Troops. She completed boot camp last December and was married in May. Her husband completed boot camp about a month ago.
“Awesome,” Helkowski said. “Just awesome that we get a real tree, it’s our first Christmas at the base, and our first Christmas as a married couple. What a great program this is to make sure our military are remembered at the holidays.”
Christmas trees were distributed first to junior ranking service members on the base, according to Lt. Commander Justin Covert, including crew members of the tennant commands stationed at the Cape May Center. Trees were also donated to Coast Guard families whose loved ones are currently deployed for the holiday season, such as the crew of the Cutter Dependable, of which 75 local service members are conducting frontline Coast Guard missions.
“The support of organizations like the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation is really important to the well being of our members,” said Capt. Todd Prestidge, the commanding officer of Training Center Cape May. “A lot of men and women are deployed on missions across the world during the holidays and this foundation’s act of recognizing that sacrifice and showing support with a Christmas tree during that difficult time goes a long way in making a family’s holiday a little brighter.”
Now in its tenth year, Trees for Troops plans to deliver more than 17,000 Christmas trees to military bases in the U.S. and overseas. Trees for Troops is a program of the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation, working together with FedEx and members of the National Christmas Tree Association and many state and local Christmas Tree associations. Trees distributed at the Cape May base were from Mahoney’s Evergreens, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Richard Hearn, who works at the Cape May Training Center and is part of the Morale Well-being and Recreation (MWR) program which helps coordinate the tree distribution, said the tree donation is part of their efforts to keep morale high during the holiday season. “Businesses and families donate the trees to Trees for Troops,” he said. “It gives us a chance to say thank you to our troops, and help ensure military families have the kind of joyful, traditional Christmas memories that we would wish for America’s heroes.”
For Ramon and Karin Chavez, it means “alot that our efforts are appreciated.”
Chavez said, “It’s great to have the support and recognition of our service.” He’s been in the Coast Guard for five years, the last two in Cape May.
“It’s great that people remember the military,” his wife Karin added, as she sized up a tree to take to their home on base.
For FedEx Manager John Hewitt and driver Jim Senor, it’s a chance for a “real feel-good type of delivery.”
“We handle all types of freight every day,” Hewitt said, “and to be able to deliver these trees to the men and women in the military who defend us every day is just a great experience. It’s a chance for us to recognize their contributions and make sure they have a happy holiday.”
This is Hewitt’s second year delivering trees in the area.
“It’s important that we not take our service members for granted,” added Senor, who is out of the Vineland FedEx center. “This is just a feel-good delivery that is really important to be a part of.”
Coast Guard Training Center Cape May is the Coast Guard’s only enlisted basic training facility and provides logistic, facility and administrative support services to 13 Coast Guard units that support critical Coast Guard missions locally and globally. Coast Guard Cutter Dependable is a 210-foot medium endurance cutter built for multi-week offshore patrols and conducts critical front-line Coast Guard missions including illegal migrant interdiction, counter narcotics, search and rescue, and national defense.
Since 2005, more than 122,000 free, farm-grown Christmas trees have been provided to troops and military families through Trees for Troops. Thousands of trees are donated by American farm families and the public, and FedEx delivers these trees to more than 65 military bases overseas and in the U.S. FedEx has logged more than 419,000 miles for the Trees for Troops program in the U.S.
To contact Karen Knight, email kknight@cmcherald.com.
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