It’s That Annual Emerald Event!

St. Patrick’s Day Parade

and Street Fair is Saturday

Big Sky Senior Services, Inc., (BSSS) and the Save Our Parade Committee have organized the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade and Celtic Street Fair for Saturday, March 13, in downtown Billings. The parade will begin at 11:00 a.m. and follows the traditional downtown parade route moving west on 2nd Avenue North and east on 3rd Avenue North. At press time, over 50 parade entries had signed up, and the parade traditionally fills up with 60 to 70 entries by the time the parade is ready to marshal along its trail through Montana’s biggest city.

The street fair festivities are lined up between First and Third Avenues on North Broadway from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Walmart employees are sponsoring a Kids Korner with games for children. The stage, located at Skypoint, will feature various dance and music performances throughout the event.

“Join us in beautiful downtown Billings and enjoy the spirit of Erin Go Braugh during the 29th annual Billings St. Patty’s Day Parade. A fun filled day for the whole family, it is full of food, music, and great Irish tradition,” said Denise Armstrong, executive director of Big Sky Senior Services.

All proceeds from the parade, the food sales and street fair activities benefit Big Sky Senior Services in its mission to enhance the independence and quality of life for the elderly population and developmentally disabled adults, regardless of their ability to pay.

About Big Sky Senior Services

Senior Helping Hands is a state-licensed home health agency and primarily serves isolated, indigent seniors in their homes. Their clients have lost some of their physical and/or mental abilities due to old age and/or illness.

As a result, they are no longer able to perform all tasks daily living requires, and they need help with these tasks in order to be able to remain in their homes. Clients contribute to the cost of their own care based on income and ability to pay. Most clients pay only $1 a week for their services.

The services the staff members provide include homemaking, meal preparation, transportation, shopping, socialization, respite care, nursing care, health monitoring, medication management, assistance with personal care and hygiene, home safety checks, education about and assistance with disaster planning

Prevention of Elder Abuse serves vulnerable elders and developmentally disabled adults. PEA provides social workers that respond to allegations of abuse, neglect and exploitation. Social workers also provide case management to those who have no other support system and work closely with Adult Protective Services to provide ongoing oversight of clients.

Providing Community education, financial institution training educates employees on how to recognize and report financial exploitation, the Friends Volunteer Program providing companionship and safety to isolated, homebound elders, and the phone friends program are other services. Big Sky Senior Services is in Billings at 3 North 35th Street, 259-3111, bigskyseniorservices.org