I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciate what you did to help make my Eagle Scout community service project such a success.

During the month of June, 3,000 members of the Hicksville community received flyers at their homes, distributed by my fellow members of Hicksville's Boy Scout Troop 382. The flyer asked for a donation of children's books which would be picked up at the resident's doorstep the following Saturday. I cannot tell you how overwhelmed I am by the generosity of the people in Hicksville! Hundreds of households left bags and boxes of books. Many of you called me and some wrote very nice notes telling me how proud they are of my work and wished me luck with my project.

As a result of the generosity of people like yourself, I was not only able to achieve my initial goal of collecting 2,000 books but instead my troop helped me to collect a total of more than 5,000 children's books. These books were donated to two very special charitable organizations -- Toys for Sick Children and Hewlett House (a support facility for women with breast cancer and their families). Jim Reed of Toys for Sick Children and Debbie Blick of Hewlett House would also like to express their thanks to you for your helping hand in this project.

I am so proud to be a part of this community and you should be proud of yourselves for giving above and beyond anyone's expectations.

Thank you again!

Matthew McNiff, Life Scout
Boy Scout Troop 382