Local radio stations 92.9 The Point (92.9 FM) and 99X (99.7 FM), with sponsors, hosted a record-breaking “Stuff the Truck” Toy Drive on Dec. 16 that featured a special appearance by Keven Smith and Jason Mewes, known more famously as the film duo Jay and Silent Bob.
The annual “Stuff the Truck” event is a four-hour donation drive that collects new toys for La Plata Family Centers Coalition, which distributes them to La Plata County children in need of some cheer this holiday season. In previous years, the toy drive usually concludes when donations fill the truck. This year, the community stuffed the truck and kept donating until two additional truck-beds were full of toys.
“It must have been a record year,” said 92.9 program director Dustin “Deakon Jones” Nolen.
Local businesses, including Durango Kids Pediatric Dentistry, Black Bear Carpet Cleaning and Repair, Wood Chiropractic and Studs Lumber Co., hosted drop-off locations where community members could donate toys to be pooled together at the Dec. 16 event. Durango Motor Co. supplied a truck that was on display as shoppers filled it with toys from noon to 4 p.m. in the Walmart parking lot. Even after the truck was stuffed, the donations kept flowing in.
“It took eight people about 30 minutes to unload all the donations,” said 99X Program Director Cody “Kopp” Mellor.
Nolen remembered that Smith and Mewes, who gained recognition playing characters Jay and Silent Bob in Smith’s 1994 film “Clerks,” were in Durango for the “Jay and Silent Bob Get Old” stage show that evening. He contacted their tour manager to ask if the two would make a radio appearance during the donation event, but he didn’t expect them to actually show up.
Smith and Mewes not only made a radio and Facebook Live appearance, but went into Walmart and bought two shopping carts full of toys to donate to the Family Center. They stuck around, too, and posed for photos, talked with people, signed autographs and even took the time to talk to a homeless family, and gave them what Nolen assumed to be some amount of money.
Nolen and Mellor said that the special appearance was a high point of the afternoon because Smith and Mewes, as celebrities who just happened to be in Durango during a tour, chose, of their own volition, to spend time at and donate to a benefit for La Plata County children.
Toys weren’t the only thing donated during the toy drive. Joe Lloyd, founder of Durango Joes Coffee, donated $700, and Nolen and Mellor estimate at least another $200 in cash donations were collected from the community during the event.
“Durango’s generosity and kindness never ceases to amaze us. We’re forever grateful,” said Nolen.
Event sponsors included: Coca-Cola Durango; Mile High Plumbing, Inc.; Tru Auto Deals, Inc.; Leavitt Group; Durango Chamber of Commerce; Animas Valley Audiology; Directory Plus; Animas Trading Co.; Rocky Mountain Health Plans; First Southwest Bank; Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad; Rock Solid Custom Granite; Smiles 4 Kids Dental; Eye.D. Eyewear Durango; McDonald’s; Brennan Stations; Fairway Independent Mortgage; Animas Foot and Ankle; Chem-Dry of the Southwest; Durango Motor Co.; Exit Realty Home & Ranch; Express Employment Professionals; Grease Monkey; ReyLynn’s Barber Lounge and Hair Studio; and Supernova Furniture.
For more information about La Plata Family Centers Coalition, visit www.lpfcc.org.
fstone@durangoherald.com
