Everyone in the DeKalb community, including NIU students, can benefit from the help provided by the Salvation Army.

The Salvation Army, 830 Grove St., offers a variety of programs for disadvantaged people as well as those not suffering from financial problems.

Peggy Carey, a Salvation Army social worker, said the Self Help And Resource Exchange is one program not based on income and available to everyone.

SHARE was created by Chicago corporate executive Carl Shelton. Shelton decided to start the program to help ease the economic burden of the American family and to “get Americans reaching out to Americans,” Carey said.

The program is community based and provides food each month to participants. Everyone involved in the program must pay $13 and provide two hours worth of community service to receive $30 to $36 worth of food, Carey said.

The community service can be “anything that’s helping another person” and is verified “on your honor,” she said.

Carey said few NIU students are involved in the program. “We don’t have near what we should have,” she said.

Through the SHARE program, the Salvation Army supplies about 115 units of food per month, but “we could easily do twice or three times that,” Carey said.

A typical month’s worth of food includes meat, fresh fruit and vegetables and staples, Carey said. The food is bought in bulk for the entire nation and DeKalb gets its supply from the Salvation Army’s Rockford division, she said.

SHARE serves both families and singles and receives no government funding. The program is carried out mostly by volunteers who distribute the food in DeKalb and stock the Salvation Army pantry, Carey said.

“The days that we work with the groups, we have a really good time,” she said. “It’s fun.”

The Salvation Army offers other programs to help people who need it. “We help anybody in a financial crisis. We don’t have any rule that’s hard and fast,” Carey said.

“We are looking to offer a series of classes to teach people skills to help them maintain housing,” Carey said.

The classes will include budgeting, getting along with landlords and how to make minor house repairs. They wil be free and open to the public, and possibly offered next fall, she said.