The people who bring you the mail have also been organizing the Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive every year for the past 22 consecutive years. It's one of America's great days of giving. This year's food drive will be Saturday, May 10 - the same weekend as Mothers' Day.
Letter carriers walk through American communities every day, often coming face to face with something that's a sad reality for too many - hunger. So, each year on the second Saturday in May, letter carriers across the country collect non-perishable food donations from their customers, donations that go directly to local food pantries.
In Winnemucca, food collected during the Letter Carriers Food Drive will go to replenish the local food bank. Every bit of the food collected stays right in Winnemucca.
The timing of this spring food drive is crucial. Food banks and pantries often receive the majority of their yearly donations during Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. By springtime, the shelves are depleted from the winter and school breakfast and lunch programs aren't available to children in need during the summer.
Last year, the Letter Carriers Food Drive collected over 74 million pounds of food nationwide. That amount fed an estimated 30 million people. Over the course of its 21-year history, the food drive has collected well over a billion pounds of food, thanks to a postal service network that spans the entire nation, including Puerto Rico, Guam and U.S. Virgin Islands.
In 2013, 2880 pounds of food was collected locally, staying right in the community to fill local needs.
In a country as well-off as America, it doesn't seem possible that one in six people are unsure where their next meal is coming from, but those are the statistics. Sixteen million children feel hunger's impact on their overall health and ability to perform well in school, and nearly five million seniors over the age of 60, many of whom live on fixed incomes, are food insecure.
Participating in this year's Letter Carrier Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive is simple. Just leave a non-perishable food donation in a bag by your mailbox on Saturday, May 10 and your letter carrier will do the rest![[In-content Ad]]