Diaper Dandies provides baby supplies for low-income families

Nov. 18--A Fort Smith nonprofit has made helping low-income families get the diapering supplies they need a top priority.

Diaper Dandies is a mission of St. Paul United Methodist Church. It assists low-income families in the community by providing diapers, wipes and diaper rash ointment for their babies and toddlers.

Steve Poarch, pastor of St. Paul United Methodist Church, said his role with the Diaper Dandies ministry is "kind of an overseer," as well as its originator. It got started in 2014.

"In the years prior to that ... we had families come in looking for assistance all the time and people that were helping," Poarch said. "And I noticed on numerous occasions that the children that they often brought with them were in diapers that had been soiled and unchanged for quite some time, and just felt a need to offer some type of assistance because we understood the economics behind what was going on, and ... it was one of those things that out of compassion we said, 'Children need to have clean diapers.'"

Poarch said Diaper Dandies does not have regularly scheduled events through which to distribute supplies to families. It does them as funding becomes available. The goal of the ministry is to have at least four distributions a year, and the goal of each distribution is to reach 100 babies. Families receive about a two weeks' supply of diapers, a package of wipes, and, if needed, a tube of diaper rash ointment for each baby per event. These events are held at the church and are scheduled to run for two hours or until the supply runs out.

Mary Huss, chair of missions at St. Paul United Methodist Church and of Diaper Dandies, said the organization intentionally designed how it provides these items to be as respectful and noninvasive as possible when dealing with people of low income.

"For instance, most agencies or groups that do this kind of thing require quite a substantial amount of ... validation of residence and utility bills and sort, and we choose not to do that," Huss said. "We choose to operate on the honor system, which works for us most of the time. We require them to sign in, the parent or the caregiver. ... They sign their name, they put the telephone number where they can be reached because before each distribution, I make random calls, and the underground communication network among poverty-level people takes over."

Huss said a few fliers are also made the day before each distribution. However, Diaper Dandies does not advertise or publish anything in advance, with Huss calling it unnecessary.

"The word got out by a few Facebook individuals that we were having a distribution (in late August)," Poarch said. "... There were people arriving here before 9 o'clock, and by the time we opened it at 10 a.m., we had, oh, 75 people in line, and we did distribution of 126, and most of those were within the first hour."

All the money for distributions, Poarch said, is raised through fundraisers and donations. Huss said the cost of each distribution is between $2,500 and $3,000. The membership of Diaper Dandies consists entirely of volunteers.

Poarch said the ultimate goal of Diaper Dandies is to extend the love and grace of Jesus Christ by helping its neighbors through tangible ways.

"We realize that just keeping baby bottoms clean has a much bigger effect because it's a ... financial impact on the family that allows them to buy food or other necessary items if we take care of diapers and wipes and ointment," Poarch said.

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