With the holiday shopping season in full swing, the “Be a Santa to a Senior” gift giveaway program is gaining momentum, adding two more tree locations at Alcoa Fastening Systems and Citizen Watch Co in Torrance, CA. The trees are filled with paper ornaments listing gift requests from seniors served by the Salvation Army Sage House and Adult Day Care Center, South Bay Senior Services, Beach Cities Health District, Palos Verdes Health Care Center and Inglewood Senior Center.

“We’re grateful for this additional community support so we can help create a brighter holiday for more seniors who are often the forgotten ones at this time of year,” said Denise de Cock, RN, owner of the Home Instead Senior Care office serving Torrance, Palos Verdes and Marina del Rey. “We’re asking shoppers to pick an ornament from a tree and be a Santa to a homebound senior who will be thrilled that someone remembered them at holiday time.”

The Be a Santa to a Senior community service program, which runs through Dec. 22, is organized to ensure that seniors get the items they need and want. Before the holiday season, participating local non-profit organizations identified needy and isolated seniors in the community and provided those names to Torrance Home Instead Senior Care. Christmas trees, which are now up in ten locations in the area, feature ornaments with the first names only of the seniors and their respective gift requests.

Holiday shoppers are asked to pick up an ornament, buy items on the list and return them unwrapped to the tree location, along with the ornament attached. Torrance Home Instead Senior Care then enlists the volunteer help of its staff, senior-care business associates, non-profit workers and others to collect, wrap and distribute the gifts. A citywide gift-wrapping day, when hundreds of presents will be wrapped, will be held on December 17, 3:30 – 7 p.m. at the Salvation Army of Torrance Adult Day Care Center, 4223 Emerald St.

This is the sixth year that Be a Santa to a Senior has made a difference in the lives of seniors. Last year, more than 28,000 volunteers nationwide distributed gifts to deserving seniors. Since introducing the Be a Santa to a Senior program, the corporate office of Home Instead Senior Care and its network of more than 800 franchises in the United States and 11 other countries have helped provide more than one million gifts to 700,000 seniors.

To learn more about this program, visit www.beasantatoasenior.com.
For more information about the company, call 1-800-FOR SENIORS or visit www.homeinstead.com/286.