Mail Carriers to Pick Up Food Donations

People wishing to participate in the national mail carriers food drive Saturday are asked to put nonperishable donations in or near their mailboxes.

Postal workers will pick them up and distribute them to food banks. The donations will feed people in the areas they were collected.

The drive provides nearly half the nonperishable goods that Food Share, Ventura County’s largest food bank, distributes each year.

“It’s critical,” said Food Share Director Jim Mangis. “It’s a stream of food that we cannot find anywhere else.”

Last year, county residents donated about 69 tons of food to Food Share and other food banks. The nationwide drive brought in 33,000 tons.

According to Mangis, the growing number of low-income workers is taxing the food bank’s resources.

“What they’re earning just doesn’t spread across what they need,” he said.

Forty-four percent of clients apply to local food banks because of insufficient income from full- or part-time jobs, Mangis said.

County postal workers with the National Assn. of Letter Carriers Local 2902 have participated in the drive since its first year, said President Beverly Mattes.

“Letter carriers in general want to do something to give back to the community,” she said. “It also makes it easy for the community to give to those who are less fortunate.”

Critical food needs include all canned goods, pasta, rice, beans, meats, cereals, powdered milk, crackers and personal care items.

The union and the food banks ask that residents not donate items in glass containers.