COAL GROVE - Cuddly little teddy bears will soon be riding shotgun with Coal Grove police officers, ready to lend assistance when needed.

The Waterloo Masonic Lodge 532 and the Waterloo Eastern Star 447 Tuesday donated teddy bears to the Coal Grove Police Department.

This is one of two community service projects those two organizations have undertaken this month. They also provided hats and gloves to kindergarten and Head Start students at Symmes Valley Elementary School.

"We enjoy community service projects and we came up with a hat and glove drive for Symmes Valley," Eastern Star

Worthy Matron Annabelle Jenkins said. "The Masons wanted to help us with this and we ended with with more money than what it took for the hats and gloves.

So we came up with the idea of donating the teddy bears to the police department."

"We wanted to do something to make children feel special," said Greg Boggs, Worshipful Master of the Masons.

Coal Grove Police Sgt. Jason Bloomfield said the teddy bears will be kept in cruisers so that when officers need them, they will be available. "A lot of the situations we go to where kids are involved, nine times out of 10, it's not a good situation for a child to be in, sometimes they're the victim and often the child sees everything that takes place," Bloomfield said. "On behalf of the Coal Grove Police Department we extend our thanks to the Masons and the Eastern Star."