Dogwood Park Baby Supply Event Supported By The Cookeville Community

The State Department of Human Services was at Cookeville’s Dogwood Park Friday giving supplies to new and expectant parents.

Some 20 local organizations and service providers set up for the first state sponsored baby celebration in Cookeville. Human Services Director of Operations Robert Duck said the outreach event stopped in the city at the request of local state employees.

“Really, really excited about the turnout today,” Duck said. “I’ve been doing events like this for almost 20 years with the department, and I would say this is the best turnout I have seen. We are very excited to be here and a part of the Cookeville community today.”

Parents received free baby supplies and information of child services for those in need. Duck said the department gained great support from local partners when reaching out about the event.

“We do outreach events across the state,” Duck said. “It was suggested we hadn’t been out to the Cookeville area, and we would have a lot of community support if we came here. So, we started working on putting together an event supporting parents with new children. When we started calling around the community, we got a lot of responses.”

One local organization present was the Cookeville Pregnancy Clinic. Client Advocate Heather Daza said the non-profit was there offering free wipes, diapers and highlighting its parent education program.

“We love our families,” Daza said. “We love what we do. We love our community, and we love what we do.”