Food Can Tree May Grow to 20 Feet Tall by Christmas
At more than 20 feet tall and 10 feet wide, it will be one of the area’s largest Christmas trees. And at 16 tons, it will certainly be one of the heaviest.
The Southeast Board of Realtors, along with the Salvation Army and area churches, has launched a campaign to create a “Christmas can tree” from as many as 32,000 cans of food, enough to feed up to 500 families on Christmas.
If all goes well, case upon case of canned food will form the tree in the parking lot of a Salvation Army building in Huntington Park. On Dec. 22, the food will be distributed to needy families in Bell, Bell Gardens, Cudahy, Huntington Park, Maywood, South Gate and Vernon, said Jessica Maes-Rico, a member of the real estate board and president of the Huntington Park Chamber of Commerce.
As the economy slows down, service organizations are receiving more calls for assistance, Maes-Rico said. “It seems there is more unemployment than before. More people are asking for help.”
The Southeast Board of Realtors followed the lead of the Modesto board, which held its first Christmas canned-food drive in 1977 and has organized statewide drives every year since then, said Frank Riser, president of Christmas CanTree Inc., a nonprofit organization established to run the event.
“The (storage) box always overflowed. The easiest way to stack the cans was up in a pyramid,” Riser said. “That gave us the idea to build a tree.”
Last year about 120 real estate boards participated in the program, collecting 3 million cans of food worth about $1.5 million, said Riser, who expects even more boards to participate this year.
The tallest tree so far has risen 28 feet, he said.
The Southeast board has held canned-food drives for several years, but its previous efforts yielded modest trees about six feet tall. This year’s program, spurred by the growing need, will be the most ambitious ever, Maes-Rico said.
“Just in the last couple of days I’ve received about a dozen phone calls from people who need help,” she said.
The board has been accepting canned food--and money to buy canned food--for the past three weeks. The campaign will continue until Dec. 17, when volunteers begin building the can tree. On Dec. 20, the tree will be dismantled and the food will be distributed to the needy, Maes-Rico said.
The Salvation Army and the Southeast Churches Service Center will distribute the food.
More information on how to contribute to the canned-food drive can be obtained by calling Maes-Rico at 564-5771 or 560-1797.
Needy people wishing to obtain Christmas food can apply between 1 and 4 p.m. Monday through Friday starting Dec. 3 at the Salvation Army, 2965 E. Gage Ave., Huntington Park, or from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m. at the Southeast Churches Service Center, 7600 State St., Huntington Park.
