Stacey Smith of La Grange doesn’t let her disabilities keep her from hitting the road running when it comes to work.

Each day, she packs a lunch and heads for her job with Subcon Packing and Assembly, a vocational training program and business at Helping Hand Rehabilitation Center in Countryside. She works the 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. shift five days a week.

“I just like to work,” Smith said. “I like the friends.”

Like most working people, Smith finds it difficult to find time for other things. Even so, she finds the time  to help others less fortunate than herself.

She, along with several other Helping Hand workmates, are now volunteering their time at the Greater Chicago Food Depository, which feeds as many as 500,000 people in need each year.

Smith, 53, said she heard about the volunteer program about two months ago and decided to lend her support. She and the others take the bus into Chicago every Monday, where food is sorted, packaged and eventually shipped to food pantries and soup kitchens in the area.

Clinical officer Stephen Lydon said Smith and other Helping Hand clients became interested in volunteering for GCFD as a result of the recent increase in homeless and hungry people.

“Now we have more and more people who want to join,” Lydon said. “It’s not that money isn’t important to these people. It’s about giving back to the community.”

Quick Hits
Family: Parents and five sisters

Favorite things to do in free time:  When she is not working or volunteering, Smith said she likes to spend time on the basketball court and, she added, she’s pretty good.

Looking forward to A trip to New York later this summer