Volunteers pack 16,000 Easter gift bags for SC inmates

COLUMBIA — For South Carolina inmates, Easter baskets take the form of clear bags stuffed with soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste, notebooks, pens, envelopes and hard candy.

Twice a year, Baptist churches across the state donate enough supplies for each of the state’s prisoners to receive a baggie of toiletries and other small items. Earlier this month, about 50 volunteers, many of them prison chaplains, packed the donations into more than 16,300 bags that went to inmates in all 21 prisons.

The bags may not seem like much to many people, but inmates look forward to them every year, volunteers said.

The prison system provides basic necessities, but many inmates can’t afford anything beyond those, like good-smelling soap and candy, said Pamela Nates, a chaplain at Kirkland Correctional Institution’s maximum security unit.

“These things are like gold for them,” Nates said.

Many inmates try to make the items last as long as possible, Nates said.

The springtime packages came several months after every inmate received an identical package at Christmastime.

The bags aren’t just about extra supplies. The prisoners get a boost from knowing people outside the prison care enough to spend time and money assembling gift bags for them. Working inside the prisons, Nates has seen the way inmates’ faces light up when they receive the packages, she said.

“They feel so isolated and are in their own little world behind the bars,” Nates said. “To know that someone on the outside is caring enough to do this is a tremendous lift for them. It gives them hope.”

Many inmates may not have had access to similar supplies even outside of prison, making the gifts extra special, Nates said.

During her six years working with inmates, she has seen the way people can change while in prison if given the proper support, and resources like the gift bags are part of that, she said.

“I believe in my heart that part of the reason they’re there is because they weren’t cared for,” Nates said. “They weren’t given the basic needs, you know, toothpaste, soap, a toothbrush.”

Volunteers had already established a rhythm in packing their bags when the Gazette arrived about 9 a.m. on April 8.

Trucks packed with supplies pulled up to the front of the Bethlehem Baptist Church building. Police officers called for some of the 10 inmates brought from the minimum-security Manning Reentry and Work Release Center to unload them.

A couple inmates, dressed in tan jumpsuits, stacked bags and boxes of supplies along one wall of a yellow-painted gymnasium. Others brought those supplies to the folding tables set up throughout the room, where volunteers dumped out their contents, sorting them and packing them into plastic baggies.

Those baggies went into navy blue sacks that chaplains delivered to inmates the next day.

Unlike other programs, inmates can receive the gift bags regardless of their disciplinary record. However, the goal is still to encourage good behavior by reminding inmates that there is hope for them when they leave, said Corrections Director Bryan Stirling.

“It gives them incentive to still behave and a connection on the outside, to know that there are people out there that want to contribute and give them toiletries but are also praying for them,” Stirling said.

The supplies and volunteers came from the Baptist Educational and Missionary Convention’s approximately 1,100 member churches across the state. Their faith inspired them to do as much as possible to help others less fortunate, said Michael Cannon, a chaplain at eight Midlands prisons.

One verse from the book of Matthew in particular guided him: “When I was in prison, you visited me,” said Cannon, who is also a member of the Baptist convention at Piney Grove Missionary Baptist Church.

“We want to be in line with the Scripture, to be a blessing to the inmate population by giving them gifts and showing them love to support what the Scripture says,” Cannon said.