Help “Stamp Out Hunger” This Saturday

It’s the largest one-day food drive in the country, and they need your help. 

Every year, letter carriers – your “mailman” or woman – along with the mail, collect donated food items along their routes. The “Stamp Out Hunger” food drive has provided 1.9 billion – that’s with a “B” - pounds of food nationwide since its inception. People put containers of non-perishable food in bags and leave them by their mailboxes or in condominium mailrooms, and help feed the many people who literally don’t know where their next meal is coming from.

In Collier County, food items donated here stay here, going to families in this community. All of the food goes to Meals of Hope, to be distributed at their 15 weekly food pantries throughout the area. Last year alone, they collected and gave out 79,000 lbs. of food from the Stamp Out Hunger drive, said Meals of Hope founder and CEO Steve Popper. The food drive takes place on the second Saturday each May - that’s this Saturday, May 11. 

On Marco Island, food donated along the island’s 15 postal routes is taken to the post office on Elkcam Circle, said Elliott Mascoop, a retired letter carrier who, with his wife Rivka, coordinates the local effort. There on Saturday afternoon, they sort the donations and load them aboard Meals of Hope trucks, with the help of volunteers.

“The volunteers are key,” said Mascoop. “It’s all about timing. The food comes in and around 3:00 PM, we need the help to get it sorted and processed.” He encouraged anyone interested in helping to call him at 239-298-1339 or Rivka at 239-595-2932.

They do have a cadre of volunteer drivers going around the island helping collect the donations from mailboxes and condo mailrooms. “The mail carriers have the mail to pick up and deliver. Without the volunteers, it wouldn’t be possible.” 

The collection effort is often referred to as a canned goods drive, but any non-perishable, non-expired food items are welcome, whether they be in cans, boxes or bags. Meals of Hope supplements these donations with frozen meats, fresh produce, and other items such as diapers and sanitary napkins, much of it donated by local grocers such as Publix, Winn-Dixie, Aldi, Sam’s Club, Costco, and others. 

“This is so important for us. We are the largest food pantry in the state of Florida,” said Popper, whose operation also serves hungry clients nationwide. “We’re serving 4,000 families a week” in Collier County. “Even at the height of Covid, we weren’t serving this many. We try to give people enough food for a week.” With today’s inflation and ever-climbing housing costs, “we have people coming today for food who used to donate,” he said.

This time of year is critical for food pantries and the people they provide for, said Phil Dine, communications coordinator for the National Association of Letter Carriers, the postal workers union that created the Stamp Out Hunger drive in 1993. 

“By spring, food pantries are depleted. They’ve pretty much run out of the food donated over the holidays. And the kids don’t get the free meals over the summer they get during the school year.” One in eight Americans, he said, lives with food insecurity, not knowing if they will have enough to eat from day to day. 

Meals of Hope is best known locally for the massive food packing event they hold each year at Marco Island Charter Middle School, along with social events to raise money to fund that effort. 

Those who have participated in the fast-paced, high-energy packing events know they provide a lot of meals. But Meals of Hope has just reached a milestone in their efforts. 

On Monday, team members and volunteers gathered at Lely Presbyterian Church to celebrate one hundred million – that’s 100,000,000 – meals packed and donated to alleviate hunger. 

Meals of Hope can always use monetary donations, and they traditionally are able to stretch the dollars five times greater than a retail food purchaser who buys food to donate, as well as targeting the exact items they need. But people like the hands-on aspect of giving actual food items, knowing they will go to families who will eat that very can of soup or tuna. And every donation helps, said Mascoop. 

“We’ve been doing this food drive since 2005,” he said. “We’re feeding hungry and homeless people. You can’t do anything much better than that.” 

So, put your non-perishable food items out with your mail on Saturday, and know you are helping to provide for your neighbors, part of a great outpouring of caring, the largest food drive in the United States.