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'Trinity Cares' makes donations to Dixon food pantries

By STAFF REPORT
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Margo Empen, superintendent of Dixon Public Schools accepts a donation from Brett Nicklaus of Trinity Financial in Dixon. The money was raised from the Trinity Care funds and will be used to pay the kindergarten through eighth-grade outstanding school lunch balance. (Brett Nicklaus)

DIXON – Brett and Julie Nicklaus founded "Trinity Cares" in 2019, with a dual mission in mind.

“When Julie and I founded Trinity Cares we decided to donate a percentage of Trinity Financial's' weekly gross income for two reasons: We wanted Trinity Cares to cover all of the expenses associated with “Bags For The Brave” events, thus allowing 100% of corporate and family contributions to go directly to the Honor Flight and we also wanted to build a “care” fund so if there was a need in the Sauk Valley, like there is today we could help,” Nicklaus said.

In 2019, Trinity Cares raised and donated $33,348 to the Lee and Whiteside County Honor Flight committees to send local veterans on an honor flight, made possible by generous support from local families and businesses.

Thanks to weekly contributions from Trinity Financial, which Nicklaus owns, on April 24, the second mission was accomplished.

"I was inspired by the couple who donated their stimulus check to the Morrison schools to pay the overdue hot lunch balances. So, we called the Dixon, Rock Falls, and Sterling elementary schools. I learned that each school has their unique differences. Rock Falls elementary schools provide all their students with lunch so there are no overdue balances. Sterling’s balance was too large for us to work with at this time so we have scheduled a meeting for late August to determine how we can best help them."

Trinity Cares donated $2,131 to pay off Dixon’s kindergarten through eighth-grade outstanding lunch balance.

Trinity Cares also donated $2,500 to the Sauk Valley Food Bank for its support of all the food banks in the Sauk Valley; and set aside $2,000 for the "Hands Up" fund to help veterans and their families who have lost their job or been forced to shut down their businesses due to COVID-19. For more information, contact Brett Nicklaus at brett@trinityifs.com or 815-973-3636. The "hand-up" funds will be confidential.

Nicklaus also stated, "Trinity Cares is humbled to share their blessings with others so that they may be blessed."