ERWIN, Tennessee — Unicoi County has been one of the hardest hit communities by historic flooding from the remnants of Hurricane Helene. In order to streamline relief efforts, the Unicoi County Emergency Management Agency has set up a system where people can deliver items to help.
Evergreen Free Will Baptist Church is the drop-off site in Erwin. The address for that church is located at 910 Hoback Street. The church is open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for donation drop-offs.
Noah Taylor, the church's pastor, said people are driving in donations from Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia. He said one driver brought supplies from Pennsylvania and said it's been overwhelming seeing the care and compassion from people all over helping his community.
"Well, we’re certainly a community that has a lot of needs and this help — we appreciate it, but we need it and the need will be ongoing and so anything that people can do to help us rebuild our community, we just so greatly appreciate. We love it here. We live in a great part of the state, great part of the country. We as a community are rebuilding and we’re excited about doing that," he said.
Cars lined up at the church as people dropped off supplies to help out the people affected by the historic flooding. The room was filled with items like body wash, shelf-stable foods and blankets. Taylor said the supplies are being taken to remote areas.
"It’s being distributed into various communities that are inaccessible, and so the rescue team is distributing some of these items. There are side-by-sides and four-wheelers that are taking these items into the mountains. A lot of roads have been washed out. It was distributed to, also, other distribution locations that are more in the south end of the county. We’ve taken stuff in North Carolina to be distributed all over the people that are in need," said Taylor.
The Unicoi County EMA Facebook page has a list of what people can donate, where they can drop off those donations and where people can pick up items from.
Items currently needed are things like flashlights, cleaning supplies, candles and blankets. One thing the church is not accepting at this time is clothing donations.