PHOTO PROVIDED Lt. Colonel Edgar George Jr. and Lt. Colonel Barbara George.

The new divisional leaders of the Salvation Army, Lt. Colonel Edgar George Jr. and Lt. Colonel Barbara George bring with them 17 years of experience which they shared that they use to address the often diverse needs of people in the Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware Division they serve.

The Salvation Army Williamsport and the Salvation Army Lock Haven are part of this division.

Edgar will serve as Divisional Commander providing oversight for the division’s corps community centers and operations, ensuring services reach individuals and families in need. Barbara, in her role as Divisional Director of Women’s Ministries and Officer Development, will oversee programming, ministry development and social services across the region.

The division includes 42 corps, the Philadelphia Kroc Center, the Camp Ladore, Retreat and Conference Center in Waymart, Pennsylvania, 94 officers and more than 1,200 employees serving 39 counties in Pennsylvania and Delaware. It encompasses both rural and urban areas.

“My wife and I have come from diverse backgrounds. First of all, she’s from the inner city. I’m not. We have served in various places, more inner city than not really but what we really focus on is equipping our officers, the local leaders, to figure out what the army needs in those specific situations. We have some that are a little more comfortable in the urban areas, some that are more comfortable in the rural areas, and we just seek to meet the needs of these specific communities,” Edgar said.

Barbara added that “our Salvation Army personnel are as diverse as the people we serve, as well as our employees. And so oftentimes in the areas we have 42 centers around eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware, oftentimes the people that are employed there are local people, so they were familiar with their needs they have a unique understanding of individual culture, whether it’s rural or suburban or urban, and are better able and equipped to meet the needs of those communities.”

They both emphasized that the Salvation Army has always been called to serve the “most vulnerable in our population.”

“Depending on the specific community, it may look a little different, but some of the things that we’re really working hard at is food insecurity. Solving food insecurity, working with other agencies to do that as well,” Edgar said.

“Clothing assistance, housing insecurity is a big problem,” he continued. “Whether it’s keeping folks in the homes that they are living in-apartments or their homes-helping them with rental assistance or utility assistance is a big one as we approach the colder months, or emergency shelters.”

“The other thing is we do all kinds of daily programs and weekly programs. We have after-school programming for children, senior programs, all of that on site. We have summer day camps to help give children a safe, supervised place to be while school is off,” he added.

As a church, the Salvation Army also brings a spiritual component to their programs.

Barbara added that food and housing insecurity also creates a toll on people both emotionally and spiritually.

“The constant worry of where the next meal is going to come from or when am I not going to be able to pay the rent or how do I keep my oil tank filled really wears a person down. Not just the physical need of a person, but the emotional and mental impact that takes,” she said.

“So our spiritual and emotional programs are certainly a priority for a need for us at this point now, just to help people cope,” she added.

“No one wants to be faced with, do we buy food and feed the family, or do we fill the oil tank? But we can’t do both, and so as the Salvation Army we step in and help them make that choice, because that’s really not a choice. Feed the family or leave the oil heat on. Nobody wants to be faced with that, and so we help with that,” Edgar said.

One of the things that the Georges said that they wanted to also focus on was strengthening the division’s youth outreach. They shared what they might look like as they begin their new post.

“The future of the Salvation Army, the future of the world lies in our young people, right? It’s not tomorrow, it’s today. And you know, we live in a society where increasingly, with digital communication, the need for more personal and face to face interaction is prominent. So in our centers, we’ve encouraged our Salvation Army unit to really think outside the box. What can we offer the young people of today that would bring them together face to face, be able to address the challenges of youth today, whether that’s a drop in center or a basketball or gym program, or we offer music and craft programs and creative arts programs in many of our centers, if not all of them,” Barbara said.

“We’re trying to empower our local Salvation Army officers on the ground to think creatively and do an outreach to the youth in their community. Now, some of our places are very active with youth programming, but in the places where we’re not, that’s a priority for us,” she said.

“I’m a product of the scouting program. I happen to be an Eagle Scout with three Eagle Scout sons, and credit the scouting program in part for the leader that I am today. I would love to afford other children, boys and girls, that kind of opportunity. Give them a great appreciation of the outdoors, but also help form them as the leaders that we need. As my wife said, not tomorrow, today,” Edgar said.

The Georges also seek to expand the engagement of the Salvation Army within the communities they serve so that, as Barbara said, “if the Salvation Army were to close up in any of our communities where we have a building and a presence, that the neighborhood would feel that.”

“We want to make sure that our local units are so engaged with the community in whatever need is expressed that it would be a travesty if the Salvation Army ever left town…We want to make sure that communities are not only aware of our presence and what we bring to the table, which many, many are in relation to our social services, but we also are encouraging again our local Salvation Army leaders to have their finger on the pulse of unmet needs in their community. Lots of communities have food pantries. Lots of communities can help with grants for rent and utilities. What are we missing? That’s what we’re encouraging our salvation armies to do-get out in the community. What are we missing that your community needs, that we may be able to address,” Barbara said.

“It’s also an effort to be collaborative in how we work. We realize that as the Salvation Army, we can’t meet all the needs, and we need to know all our community partners. We need to be at the table with all our community partners so that collaboratively, as a community, we can meet the needs of the people,” she added.

As the holiday season progresses, the work of the Salvation Army increases, with programs such as toy and food distributions as well as the appearance of the familiar bell ringers at various locations in the area.

“Christmas is our busiest time of year in many, many ways. All of our centers participate in bell ringing; all of our centers participate in toy distributions; all of our centers participate in food distribution. So all of those things are happening simultaneously,” Barbara said.

“I can’t help but think about food distributions, whether it’s Thanksgiving or Christmas, but on- site feedings and all of those we have skeleton staff. I like to refer to it as a smaller staff. So we rely very heavily on volunteers, whether it’s to ring bells to raise the money to provide all these services,” Edgar said.

“You should know, the money at the kettles is not just for Christmas. It goes to help our year round service. But you know, we rely on volunteers to ring the bells. We rely on volunteers to help us cook and feed. We rely on volunteers to help sort toys and distribute the toys. Some of those are not hard to find volunteers for. It’s a lot of fun to give out toys to children. Sometimes we have more than what we can use. It’s the rest of the year when we really could use volunteers to feed kids in an after school program, or to help put together a snack or something like that. That’s as rewarding as the Christmas toys and the Thanksgiving dinners,” he said.

The Georges stressed that they appreciate the support that the Salvation Army receives every year either through donations or volunteer hours.

“We recognize we can’t do it alone. We need every community to join us in this effort to make life better for the most vulnerable among us,” Barbara said.

Prior to this appointment, the Georges served as Divisional Leaders for the Northeast Ohio Division beginning in 2023. They previously served in the Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware Division from 2019 to 2023, a period that included the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, with Edgar as General Secretary and Barbara as Divisional Secretary for Program. Their past leadership also includes roles at the Boston Kroc Center, in divisional youth ministries in Western Pennsylvania and in divisional roles in New Jersey. Barbara also brings an extensive background in Emergency Disaster Services.

For more information about The Salvation Army’s ongoing work in Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware, visit https://easternusa.salvationarmy.org/eastern-pennsylvania/.