photo by: Nick Gerik

A recent post offering help during the COVID-19 outbreak is seen on a Lawrence neighborhood Nextdoor website through distortions caused by a camera lens, Monday, March 30, 2020.

Lawrence resident Kristen Chaney was supposed to go to California to see her new grandchild, but she had to cancel the trip because of the coronavirus pandemic. At home instead, she put a message on social media, saying she could do errands for people who needed anything.

“I was just feeling kind of useless at home and kind of down about not getting to go to California to meet my new grandbaby,” Chaney said. “I figured I’d just reach out and see if anybody needed any help.”

And Chaney is not alone. Several other Lawrence residents have used neighborhood Facebook groups or the social networking app Nextdoor, which allows people to make neighborhood-based or citywide posts, to both ask for and offer favors to their neighbors. An East Lawrence man posted that he was homebound in a wheelchair and would really appreciate a couple of rolls of toilet paper. He later wrote that he had been given enough toilet paper to last him until next year.

Another woman, in University Place neighborhood, posted that she had bought a big bottle of hand sanitizer before the coronavirus outbreak and wanted to share it. She said that she’d used gloves and alcohol wipes to put the hand sanitizer in little bottles and leave them on her porch for anyone to pick up. An East Lawrence woman posted that her teenage boys could run errands for people or complete simple outdoor projects that can be done while practicing social distancing.

Michele Dillon, who works for the Jayhawk Area Agency on Aging, recently posted that she had a client living at a senior community who hadn’t been able to find bread or soap at the grocery store and asked if anyone could help. Dillon told the Journal-World that someone who saw the post responded and dropped off the supplies. Dillon said that people doing favors for strangers was nice to see, especially given that some reactions to the virus have not been positive.

“Because you also see the other side of the coin, where it is kind of every man for himself,” Dillon said. “So it’s nice to see on social media that people are doing things for others and making it work and not having the doom-and-gloom attitude. It gives you a little sunshine in your day.”

For her part, Chaney said that so far she has picked up groceries for a few people, usually just a handful of items. She uses hand sanitizer, wipes down the grocery cart and follows all health recommendations, using apps or Paypal to accept the money for groceries and leaving items on doorsteps and calling to let people know they are there. Errands she has run have included getting a few food items for a young woman whose immune system was compromised and coffee and sugar for another woman, who wanted the sugar for her hummingbird feeder.

“I’m more than happy to do that just to make people’s lives a little more normal,” Chaney said.