The annual Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive, led by letter carriers, will occur on Saturday, May 11. Community members are requested to leave non-perishable food items in their mailbox on the day of the drive for letter carriers and volunteers to pick up. All collected donations will be distributed to a local food bank in an effort to stamp out hunger.
With the help of rural letter carriers, postal employees and volunteers, the nationwide Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive has been able to deliver more than 1.9 billion pounds of food over the last 30 years. Nearly 1,500 branches of the National Association of Letter Carriers in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Virgin Islands participate in the food drive.
This year will mark the second year that the event will return to Centre County as an in-person food drive since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The State College and Bellefonte letter carrier food drive is coordinated this year by Kim Randolph, a retired letter carrier, and Donald Townsend, a current letter carrier, and made possible thanks to the helping hands of the area’s local letter carriers, organizations, businesses and community members.
“Community engagement is extremely important in the success of our food drive,” Randolph shared. “Getting support from the community is essential, and making people aware of the challenges that some families face every day is a must.”
Local businesses and organizations aid in making the annual food drive a success by providing advertising, sponsoring postcards that are delivered to the community about the events, sponsoring Valpack coupons and sharing the word around town, explained Randolph.
“Every year we hope that we will surpass the number of pounds of food from the year before,” Randolph explained. “This is not an easy goal, since it seems there are more and more people needing to use the food bank. We were told that there are about 50 families every day that visit the State College Food Bank. I do not know what the amount was before, but it has increased dramatically since the pandemic.”
The Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive requests items based on what the food bank sees as the current greatest needs. This year, they are requesting snack items, such as crackers, cookies, chips, pretzels and granola bars. Personal hygiene products, like hand and dish soap, toothpaste and toothbrushes, bar soap, body wash and detergent, are also requested.
Those interested in donating to the food drive must place their items next to the mailbox before the letter carrier delivers the mail on Saturday, May 11. From there, the carrier will take care of the rest of the process.
