Youth group ‘aims to get kids involved in community'

Shonda Trantina has always had a sense of community  — and now she wants to share that with Walton County’s youth.

Trantina remembers doing community work growing up in Arkansas.

“I was a candy striper all the way through high school,” she said. “I just loved helping out.”

 Trantina’s new youth service group held their “kick-off” meeting Dec. 3, and is “aiming to get kids involved in their community.”

“We want to encourage the kids to do small projects,” Trantina said.

She added that about 20 parents and kids attended the initial meeting, representing Emerald Coast Middle School, South Walton High, Collegiate High, Walton County Home School and OH Institute.

She said that it was mostly boys at the meeting and that she had a bunch of girls that are interested in joining too.

Jane Burns is the Chairperson for Community Walton, which is spearheading the effort, and she said she can’t wait to get the ball rolling.

“We would love to have a very active community group in Walton County,” Burns said. “Shonda has done an amazing job running with this.”

The group will focus on performing need-based deeds.

“We would ideally like to be involved with at least one service project a month,” Trantina said.

The group has already completed its first service project — decorating the Path of Grace Home in Freeport for Christmas, Trantina said.

“We would like for the kids to hear the women’s stories,” Trantina said.

Strickland-Davis Christmas Tree Farm donated a tree for the group to put in the Grace home.

“The whole idea is to give the residents hope on their path to recovery,” she said.

Trantina believes that “we have a great bunch of kids in this area and that they just need a vehicle to get going and volunteer.”

“There is no reason why we shouldn’t get the kids out and involved,” she said. “They need to know how good it feels after you have done something for the community.”

The types of projects the group performs are going to vary depending on need.

“The main focus of our first meeting was the homeless in the county,” Trantina said. “They immediately thought about getting sleeping bags and warm clothes.”

She said the boys were “very interested in setting up some type of soup kitchen, since Walton County does not have one.”

Other ideas included creating what they called a “giggle bag” for hospitalized children that would include games, coloring books and toys, collecting old magazines to donate to nursing homes and doctors offices, and doing a “Cinderella” prom dress program.

The “Cinderella” program would help underprivileged children have gowns to wear to prom and other dances.

The group has already been in contact with Butler Elementary about collecting their lost-and-found items to distribute to needy families.

The group’s next meeting will be Tuesday, Jan. 5 at 5 p.m. at the Coastal Branch Library.

At that meeting, participants will decide on a name for the group.

 “We told the kids to think about names,” Trantina said. “We are giving out an iTunes gift card to the kid who has the winning name.”

For more information about the Youth Service Group contact Shonda Trantina at (850) 259-4978.