Written by Alana Sayat
Development and Engagement Intern
There are 1.4 million members of Lions Club International across the globe, all united together with a simple, two-word motto: “We Serve.” In Upper Arlington, Ohio, the local Tri-Village Lions Club has been involved in service since 1950.
For Jane Jarrow, a long-time resident of Upper Arlington, joining the Lions Club in 2006 was a no-brainer.
“My grandfather was a charter member of his Lions Club and a five-time president of his club over many years, and I grew up eating the Lions mints and going to their activities,” she tells me.
That early exposure to service evolved into a desire to help others in adulthood. “Because of my family’s history with Lions Club, the logical thing for me to do was look for the local Lions Club,” she explains. “It was unusual, because I looked for them, rather than them looking for me.”
With nearly two decades of commitment to the Tri-Village Lions Club, Jane has served in many roles, including president, board member, and service chair. For the past 15 years, she has also written the newsletter for the Lions. “The Lions Club has given me the outlet to visibly see that what I’m doing makes a difference for someone today,” Jane says.
Last year, as a club, the Tri-Village Lions made a commitment to pursue projects addressing issues of hunger in the community. Jane describes how a pivotal August 2023 meeting for Network UA (a group of community nonprofit leaders), led to an idea hatching for one of the Tri-Village Lions’ largest initiatives: The Tri-Village Packers.
“I was sitting at the end of the group, listening to what everyone else was saying,” Jane explains, “and it just came to me." She had intended to introduce the idea of creating a backpack program to send food home to kids in need on three-day weekends throughout the school year but knew that the commitment would be a lot to ask. In a lightbulb moment, Jane changed her idea: what if they sent food home to kids over the five-day Thanksgiving break?
Her suggestion was met with immediate enthusiasm from the group. By the time Jane left that meeting, she already had an established group of people who wanted to be on the Steering Committee for the program including representatives from City of Upper Arlington, Northwest Kiwanis Club, Tri-Village Lions Club, Upper Arlington Schools and herself.
“Part of what was so exciting about the project was how much of a community coalition it became,” Jane says. “Although this was a Lions idea, the Tri-Village Packers is truly a community-based project. It could not have happened without the coalition of groups that came together.”
With the initial seed funding for the Tri-Village Packers coming from two grants by the Foundation-managed Good Neighbor Fund and Overmyer Hall Associates Fund, Jane explains to me how the support from the Upper Arlington Community Foundation has expanded far.
In addition to the grants for seed funding, the Foundation has a fund set up through their website to raise money for the Packers. “Most people don’t like to give seed money because they don’t know where exactly it’s going to,” Jane says. “Because the Foundation gave us seed funding for the Tri-Village Packers and created an avenue for donations, it made our initiative a going concern, allowing us to pull in other contributions."
Through the support of the Upper Arlington Community Foundation, the Tri-Village Packers were not only able to receive donations from the Tri-Village Rotary Club, the Upper Arlington Rotary Club, and the Upper Arlington Optimists Club- they also were able to raise an additional $4,000 from community contributions.
With over 60 volunteers taking part in the Thanksgiving Break distribution and 130 volunteers taking part in the Spring Break distribution, Jane estimates that 450 hours of direct service was generated by the Tri-Village community.
“The outpouring of support from the community was exciting to see and critical to making the program work,” Jane reveals. She begins to list for me the many organizations that were a part of the project: “Tri-Village Lions, Northwest Kiwanis Club, the City of Upper Arlington, the City of Grandview, Upper Arlington Schools, Grandview Schools, St. Mark’s Church, Upper Arlington Parks and Recreation, Upper Arlington Community Foundation... this would not have happened without the entire Tri-Village community coming together.”
Over the Thanksgiving and Spring Breaks of the 2023-24 school year, the Tri-Village Packers put together 200 bags for children in the Upper Arlington and Grandview school systems, 60 of which were packed to accommodate special dietary needs. The school systems were used as a firewall to maintain complete anonymity of the students who received bags containing shelf-stable food items, grocery gift cards, and activity kits.
“You cannot tell a hungry child you fed him yesterday,” Jane explains. “We consciously made a decision upfront that our focus would be on food for kids. It’s hard to say no to a hungry child, which is a big reason why we had so much cooperation and collaboration with the project.”
Jane tells me that the planning for the 2024 Thanksgiving Break distribution is already well underway. Additionally, the Packers have also begun implementing breakfast tubs at schools to be available for kids in the mornings. She says that community members looking to get involved can make a financial donation on the Upper Arlington Community Foundation’s website and stay tuned for volunteer opportunities in the fall.
I ask Jane what she’s learned through the Tri-Village Packers. Her answer? “It’s amazing how much good can get done when you don’t care who gets the credit.”