Girl Scouts earn honors

SANDPOINT — If the mission of every Girl Scout is to be a positive community force, then a few local participants have done their charter proud.

Sandpoint Girl Scout Troop 4815 members Ashley Anderson, Katie Leeth, Adrienne Rasor and Isabella Bowman-Rorman received the highest honor afforded their age group Wednesday by earning the Bronze Award. Police Chief Corey Coon showed up in his dress uniform to distribute the awards and offer them a few congratulations.

“This is the biggest award Girl Scouts of your age can receive, so this is pretty important,” Coon told the girls.

The four scouts earned their award by putting in more than 20 hours each into the “What Will You Bring to the Table?” initiative. A national outreach designed to supply meals for hungry children, the program’s goal was simple. The real question was how the scouts would pursue that goal in an attention-grabbing way.

Their answer: supply the table so the community could supply the food. The girls secured a Generation On grant, which they used to purchase lumber and supplies. They then set to work constructing a high-quality picnic table. It was no easy task, but fortunately Katie and Isabella’s dads guided the troop members as they hammered in nails and painted the completed table a distinct sky blue.

“It was hard work, but we had a lot of fun,” Isabella said.

The scouts donated this table to Farmin Park, where they set it up to collect food donations. Since the initiative goal is to address child hunger, they emphasized donations that would appeal to kids, like breakfast cereal and other fun foods.

The scouts stuck around Farmin Park for the entire duration of the farmers market, working toward their goal of collecting 500 pounds of food. While they came in short of that goal, they still managed to collect 171 pounds. The donations will be sent to the Bonner Community Food Center, where it will be dispersed to local hungry children.

“They were a little disappointed they didn’t meet their goal, but they’re excited to try again next year,” troop leader Jami Leeth said.

This is only the beginning for the What Will You Bring to the Table? program in Sandpoint. According to scout leader Debbie Love, the crew plans to revisit the event every year, likely on or around June 26, with the same goal. After all, when you work for someone else’s benefit, everyone involved comes out ahead, the scouts said.

“It makes you feel very helpful and kind to do something like this,” Isabella said.