ESCANABA -- The Salvation Army had no shortage of volunteers in their spring pasty fund-raiser. But there's something different about some of the volunteers. A few of them arrived in a community corrections vehicle.
"Um, no, I was not ordered," explained work van member, Randy Johnson. "I just took it upon myself to do some community help."
Four non-violent offenders helped chop, peel, and bake as a way to work off jail time and fines.
Community corrections workers have volunteered at the Salvation Army for eight years now. And the organization is grateful for all the help they can get.
"The community comes together," explained Salvation Army official, Betsy Cox. "They’re made up of our church people, the jail, and then friends."
Through donations, they're able to buy ingredients to make the pasties. The money raised will help Salvation Army parishioners attend summer programs.
"It'll help them defray the costs to go to camps," explained Salvation Army Major, Bill Cox. "These are men's camps, women's camps, children's camps."
And the workers are keeping busy because the orders just keep coming from around the community.
"They just pick them up," Betsy Cox said. "So this week, we have deadlines that we have to go by."
Some of the pasties are made fresh to serve, and others are wrapped in foil and stored in a cold room until they're bought and baked.
So far, there are more requests for rutabaga pasties than there are for plain meat and potato pasties.
Over 2,000 pasties will be made in two weeks. They sell for $3 each, and the Salvation Army expects to raise around $6,000.
The next pasty making fund-raiser will be held in November.
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