After another successful year in 2022, local food pantry officials are looking forward to the National Association of Letter Carriers’ “Stamp Out Hunger” food drive to come back bigger than ever for its 31st anniversary this year.
During the event, which will take place on May 13, Pine Belt residents are encouraged to fill a bag with healthy, non-perishable food and place it by their mailbox that morning. Postal carriers will then collect the food items, which will be distributed between Christian Services, Edwards Street Fellowship Center, Petal Children's Task Force, and the Salvation Army. The week of the event, Pine Belt residents will receive postcards and grocery bags with a message saying they can “Fill a Bag. Help Feed Families.”
“This is very beneficial, because the kids are going to be out of school soon, and we need all the food we can to help during the summer,” said Demaris Lee, executive director of the Petal Children’s Task Force. “So this is very important, and what the Petal post office collects, we will get to keep – it doesn’t go out of Petal.”
In addition, food collection bins will be available in the post office lobbies in downtown Hattiesburg, on 40th Avenue, and in Petal for those who receive their mail in a post office box or drawer.
“Every year, this is a huge advantage for us,” said Ann McCullen, executive director of Edwards Street Fellowship Center. “This is not a time of year where we get nearly as many food donations as the holidays, when people have service and sharing at the forefront of their minds.
“So it’s a great time of year for us to get canned food. And right now, we are serving far more people every month with groceries than we did during the (COVID-19) pandemic, so our need is certainly greater than it’s ever been in the history of our agency, as far as groceries and food.”
The national, coordinated effort by the NALC to help fight hunger in America grew out of discussions in 1991 by a number of leaders at the time, including NALC President Vincent R. Sombrotto, AFL-CIO Community Services Director Joseph Velasquez and Postmaster General Anthony Frank. A pilot drive was held in 10 cities in October of 1991, and it proved so successful that work began immediately on making it a nationwide effort.
The local drive set a record in 2019, when Pine Belt residents donated more than 53,000 pounds of nonperishable food throughout the community.
“(We also) understand that the families who are going to be receiving the brown grocery bags in their mailbox asking them to give food, a lot of them are really struggling right now too,” McCullen said. “Their budgets are tight, and it’s just a hard time for people – groceries are higher and everything is just a little bit more expensive now.
“So we understand – we just hope that people who can, who are able to give right now, will remember and they’ll participate. It’s super easy; you can’t get much easier than walking out to put something next to your mailbox, and the bag is even provided. And we really appreciate the letter carriers, because sometimes we don’t think about how much extra work that adds to them.”
To help bring awareness to the event, Hattiesburg Mayor Toby Barker will read a proclamation for Stamp Out Hunger at 10 a.m. May 11 on the steps of the post office in downtown Hattiesburg.
