Early this morning, more than 60 volunteers, who call themselves the Arkansas Dream Center, met at a Conway church and they went out to the worst hit parts of Vilonia, Arkansas to help pick up the pieces. Many of the people have no ties to the area or the people that live there.
“As soon as I heard what was going on here, my heart just sank. So as soon as I heard that they were putting a group together to come out here, I knew that I wanted to be a part of it.” said Kylee Malkmus
Malkmus drove 45 miles from her home in Bryant to Conway this morning to help out.
“I expected it to be bad, but actually coming out here is a whole different story.”
She says she didn’t exactly know what to do when she got to Vilonia, so she started picking up the stuff that mattered most to her.
“If I’d gone through something like this, my family photos and my memories, that would be most important to me.”
As she started picking up the pieces, she designated a bag for family photos and started making a pile.
Another volunteer knew the family. “They said that they know who it is. They know what she wants to save. I said I found a bunch of family photos and she seemed very excited about it.”
Malkmus saved a lifetime of memories for a family who lost everything else. She said it’s all because of a strong sense of community all over Arkansas.
“That’s what’s great about living in an area like this. Everyone wants to help everybody else out.”