Cheers to the Center for Community Resources and its partners in charity as they embark on their annual Bundle Up Butler winter coat drive.

In the coming week, they'll distribute about 600 winter coats and other warm winter wear to needy residents of Butler County.

CCR and its co-sponsors, Butler Health System and Butler Collaborative for Families, will distribute the donated coats, gloves, scarves, hats and blankets from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday at the Butler City Farmer's Market on Chestnut Street. Items will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis.

The coat distribution is part of a larger effort, the Week of Caring program coordinated by the United Way of Butler and the Rotary Club of Butler. Now in its 19th year, the annual Week of Caring mobilizes volunteers for hands-on projects to benefit nonprofit agencies and groups in the county.

Several other Week of Caring events dealing with poverty, park improvements and youth this week were sponsored by CCR, Butler Township, and Butler County Children and Youth Services.

Linda Dodd, CCR board vice president and director of human resources at Butler County Community College, says the idea is to give back to the community.

Charity is alive and well in Butler — and in the hearts of Butler's people.

Ask any downtown pedestrian, and they'll likely make the same observation: with alarming frequency, motorists are speeding up for yellow lights, and not stopping when the lights turn red.The offenders include commercial vehicles — trucks, cars, buses and even semis bearing company names and logos. Note to business owners: It's not good advertising when your vehicle runs downtown red lights.It's difficult and frustrating for municipal police who can't patrol every intersection and ticket every offender. Other public safety issues, including drugs and violent crime, demand their time and limited resources.Even so, there are specific programs and funds earmarked for traffic control.Butler Police Chief Ron Brown notes that a state program pays for extra police patrols on streets prone to aggressive driving. The Pennsylvania Aggressive Driving Enforcement and Education Project uses crash data to identify aggressive driving locations; and police target these areas for enforcement, public awareness and training. The goal is to make roads safer by reducing the number of aggressive driving injuries and deaths.Brown says Butler has participated in PADEEP for a number of years. The next campaign period is Oct. 26 through Nov. 22. Maybe a few traffic tickets handed out then will convince drivers to stop on red — but it shouldn't take the threat of a ticket to get drivers to obey the law.

Vicki Holzer says she doesn't know exactly what inspired her recent work of art — a brassiere-strewn Christmas tree celebrating her five-year anniversary of beating breast cancer and saluting October as Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The colorful exhibit in Holzer's back yard can be seen from Rowan Road in Cranberry Township.If it's true that good art engages the viewer, then Holzer's bra tree is nothing less than an inspired masterpiece. People have been adding their own bras to her display; dozens of them fill two clotheslines as well as the tree. The bras are tributes to other women who have battled cancer and survived, and memorials to those who died fighting.Holzer's own bra on the tree was her last. She doesn't need it anymore, having lost both breasts in a double mastectomy when she was diagnosed with invasive ductile carcinoma.For many, that might be frightfully intimate and private information. But it's reality for a breast cancer survivor. Even so, it takes courage to face such a reality.Thank you, Vicki Holzer, for having that courage, and artistic verve, to express what turns out to be a common sentiment and an all-to-silent common experience. Your art has profoundly touched the community.The tree will be on display — and more bras will be added — until Oct. 31, the end of Breast Cancer Awareness Month.