PORT ST. LUCIE – Communities Connected for Kids is hosting a school supplies drive for children throughout Okeechobee and the Treasure Coast - the first such drive the local dependency system has undertaken in more than a decade.

If your business or group would like to adopt a number of children and collect backpacks of supplies for them, please email Christina Kaiser at christina.kaiser@cckids.net, or call 772-528-0362.

The drive will work similarly to CCKids’ long-successful holiday collection which depends on a network of smaller collections. For example, a local business might organize a drive and then collect supplies from its employees. CCKids will arrange a pick-up time and collect from you.

The school supplies drive, which CCKids staff expect to develop gradually over the next several years, will supplement its partnership with the United Way of St. Lucie County, which has provided hundreds of bags to the local foster care community for more than 23 years.

“We have such a large community, and the number of children coming into care is increasing,” CCKids Community Relations Director Christina Kaiser said. “We think it’s prudent to begin developing other sources for school supplies and take some burden off the United Way.”

Needed supplies include notebook paper, spiral notebooks, pocket folders, composition books, crayons, markers, colored pencils, markers, glue sticks, rulers, pencils and pens – all packaged in bookbags if possible.

“We want to say what we need and what will be most helpful, but we will absolutely take anything that comes our way,” Kaiser said.

CCKids oversees foster care, adoptions and protective services in Indian River, Martin, Okeechobee and St. Lucie counties. Currently, there are about 1,000 children in care.