• Pay funds to fast offering
• Give generously to the Humanitarian Aid Fund. All money donated to this and goes to help the poor and needy of the world without regard to race, religion, or nationality.  There are no administrative costs.
• Donate usable items, including clothing, to Deseret Industries.  Not only will this benefit the needy within your community, but surplus items are sent to the Latter-day Humanitarian Center for future relief efforts.
• Volunteer to work at bishops' storehouses, canneries, and welfare farms.  Some of the commodities produced at these facilities are used to provide humanitarian aid. 
• Ask your bishop or Relief Society president what specific help is needed in the ward.
• Volunteer at an agency that assists people in your community.  Established community organizations offer many opportunities to serve - providing meals to the homeless, teaching adults to read, mentioning at-risk youth.  Such service not only blesses those in need, but fosters unity between Church members and the community. 
• Volunteer to serve a humanitarian mission. opportunities are listed in a bulletin sent monthly to bishops. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Sort Center

The following guidelines are used to produce items shipped from the Latter-day Saint Humanitarian Center to needy people throughout the world.  The guidelines help to ensure the usefulness and durability of materials.  Completed items may be shipped or delivered in person to  Latter-day Saint Humanitarian Center 1665 Bennett Road Salt Lake City, UT 84104 Telephone: (801) 240-6060 Hours: 7 am - 4:30 pm M - F

The Church strives to help people help themselves.  But there are times when people cannot help themselves, when they have no means with which to provide food, clothing, shelter or obtain medical care or other essential items.  War and natural disasters sometimes strip people of everything they own.  In such cases, the Church moves quickly to help the helpless, providing that which is essential for survival or to ring to the suffering added degrees of comfort.  Recognizing needs beyond essentials, humanitarian relief cargo often includes toys, books, paper, pencils, crayons and other items to comfort, console and cheer children. 

Because of the advance preparations made through the humanitarian center and central storehouse, the Church, in most cases, is able to respond to an emergency or disaster within hours.  CLothing, earlier sorted and baled, is ready for shipment to climates from the subtropics to the ARctic.  Food has been processed, much in dry pack, and prepared for use in areas where for one reason or another, clinics and hospitals - if they exist - might not have even the basics o care for the sick or injured. 

Many who work and serve with humanitarian relief projects emphasize that timeliness is of the essence.  "When a disaster occurs, the time for preparation is past, " said A. Terry Oakes, chairman of the emergency response committee of the Church's Welfare Services Department. 

Garry R. Flake, director of Humanitarian Service of Church Welfare Services, said, "As members contribute to humanitarian assistance, they help the Church prepare ahead so that when the moment of crisis comes, the emergency response team can move into action immediately."

Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin of the Quorum of the Twelve and chairman of the Church's humanitarian committee said, "The Church does not limit its relief efforts to its members but follows the admonition of the Prophet Joseph Smith when he said, ' A man filled with the Love of God is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranger through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race.'" (History of the Church 4:227)

While plans, ships and trucks deliver supplies to scenes of wars, storms, earthquakes, famine, poverty and many other crises throughout the world, the element that drives the church's humanitarian relief efforts is the individual whose contributions make possible those charitable acts.  The individual might voluntarily contribute financially, donate items of clothing or other goods, or volunteer time and talent to create, assemble, sort , package or prepare items for distribution to those in need.

School Kit

• 1 blackboard - 9 x 12 (Masonite )
• 1 eraser
• 1 box of 12 chalk
• 3 pencils
• 1 pencil sharpener
• 1 sm. pkg. of notebook paper (250 sheets)
• 1 pair blunt nosed scissors
• 1 durable cloth bag with drawstring or velcro closure
• Sand the edges and corners of blackboard
• paint blackboard with two coats of blackboard paint
• size the blackboard by coloring it with chalk all over using long side of chalk first with horz. strokes then with vert strokes
• drill a hole in one corner of the blackboard and attach the eraser with a 22" cord
• You may make the eraser by stuffing a soft cloth rectangle with batting
• Make the bag of heavy fabric.

Hygiene Kit

• 2 unbreakable combs
• 2 toothbrushes
• 1 tube of toothpaste
• 1 regular size bar of soap
• 4 travel-sized shampoo - Put in sealable bag
• 1 travel sewing kit
• 1 hand towel
• Put items in a heavy-duty, two-gallon sealable bag; remove air

Crocheted and Knitted Items

• Use your own patterns for slippers, booties, scarves, mittens, hats, afghans, toys or other crocheted and knitted items.
• Items should be practical and durable
• Catch stitch or pin together each finished pair of mittens, slippers, or booties. 

Do not use buttons for eyes on knitted or crocheted toys

Crocheted or Knitted Tropical Sore Bandages ( leper bandages )

• Size: 3"x 4' - 7'
• Material specifications: No 10 knit Cro-sheen 100% cotton in white or cream.  Do not use dye.
• When completed, roll bandage and secure with a large safety pin.
• Put in small sealable bag and seal.

Use size 2 knitting needles if you knit average or loosely, size 3 needles if you knit tightly. 

Cast on 24-28 so that it measure close to 3" across. Use the knit stitch all the way through (gives bandage the needed stretch)

Continue knitting until desired length and bind off.  Secure by sipping thread through last stitch, tying a double knot and weaving end back through stitches. 

When using a knitting machine, use only a double knit stitch because single knit bandages curl.

Use size D or #3 crochet hook

Chain enough stitches to measure 3" in width.  Single crochet into each chain. Chain one and turn.  Continue to single crochet to end, chain one and turn. 

Finish off by pulling thread through last loop and secure with double knot. 

Weave end back through stitches.

The red Cross in Guatemala has asked the Sort Center for supplies and equipment for a struggling charity hospital in that country.  The maternity section of the hospital lacks receiving blankets and layette.  Newborn babies currently are being wrapped in newspapers.

 
A sister missionary working in Madagascar told a friend back home: "You have not the faintest idea of what real poverty is like until you come to a place like this." 

In a 1993 project in Mozambique operated by Food for the Hungry, the group had received a Sort Center shipment of clothing.  They later wrote that the clothes were the difference between people being dressed and walking around naked. Some of the children had never worn a "new" article of clothing. 

An LDS doctor on a humanitarian mission in Russia toured a major hospital.  During the tour he asked to see the hospital medical library.  He was shown a room containing three medical books.

A sort Center shipment for Serbia included a request for some 300 crib quilts.  About that time, a shipment of service project items done by church members in the Snowflake AZ region arrived.  Among other things it included 300 crib quilts.  Service projects are NOT assigned to wards or stakes, but things seem to arrive as needed.

A woman from Mexico said after a tour of the Sort Center : "My heart is so full. I have walked in a hold place during my visit here."

The Utah National Guard offered 150 small Army cots to the Sort Center.  Officials weren't sure how they could be used or where they could be stored, ut gratefully accepted the offer.  Within days a call came from the Salt Lake Homeless Shelter asking if the Sort Center had any surplus cots.  When asked how many the shelter needed the answer came back, - 150.

A small plastic bag was brought into the Sort Center as a service project.  It contained 10 knitted stocking caps for children.  They were done by a 94 year old sister who is legally blind but still seeking to serve. 

An American woman try to adopt a child from a Romanian orphanage stayed for a month with a Romanian family in Bucharest, the capital city.  The husband of the family had an office job and owned two dress shirts.  While he was at work, his wife would wash and iron the shirt he would wear the next day.  One of the shirts had a button missing.  Each night when he came home from work, his wife would take a button off the shirt he wore that day and sew it on the shirt he was to wear the next day.  The visitor found this intolerable and went shopping for buttons.  But during the entire month of her stay, she was never able to find any. 

A hospital in Istanbul Turkey is seeking Sort Center support.  The pediatric surgery department lacks technical instruments and the newborn intensive care unit does not even possess incubators.