Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, November 17, 1994                   TAG: 9501070002
SECTION: NEIGHBORS                    PAGE: N13   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

AROUND TOWN

The Mental Health Association of Roanoke Valley has begun its annual Operation Santa Claus.

This program supplies gifts for nearly 700 Roanoke Valley residents with mental disabilities who live in area homes for adults or are patients at Catawba Hospital and Roanoke Memorial Rehabilitation Center. Many of these people have no family and live on supplemental security income or Social Security Disability income, according to the Mental Health Association.

Contributors may send cash donations by Dec. 9 to the association at P.O. Box 592, Roanoke, 24004. The money will be used to purchase gifts from a gift list put together by area homes and hospitals and the association. Make checks payable to the Mental Health Association of Roanoke Valley.

Contributors may also select items from the gift list and bring them to one of the following locations through Dec. 9: Blue Ridge Community Services; Boone and Company Realtors; Crestar Bank at Cave Spring Corners, Hollins and Towers; or the Jefferson Center.

Items on the gift list for women are: dresses, blouses, slips, nightgowns, handbags, knee high hose and knee socks. Items needed for men are: shirts, pajamas, T-shirts, caps with bills, socks, flashlights and batteries. Items needed for both men and women are: brushes and combs, gloves,toiletries, stationary and stamps, sweaters and underwear.

For more information, call the association at 344-0931.