Schuylkill County residents donated more than 27,000 pounds of nonperishable food to the 22nd annual Stamp Out Hunger food drive held Saturday.
The food was collected by U.S. Postal Service letter carriers and a final tally was not yet available Monday, according to Will Lentz, supervisor of customer service at the Pottsville Post Office.
Post office representatives were still calculating the total while workers for local food banks picked up boxes filled with canned soups and vegetables, jars of peanut butter and boxes of cake mix.
"In Pottsville, we filled 27 hampers and had about 15,600 pounds of food," Lentz said.
Usually the Stamp Out Hunger campaign brings "about 17,000 pounds" into the Pottsville Post Office, according to Bob Cook, a maintenance worker for Salvation Army, Pottsville.
Minersville Post Office collected "about 2,680 pounds," according to Amber Yerger, a letter carrier and shop steward there.
"This year, we collected enough to fill five hampers. Last year we did not participate, but the year before, the first year we participated, we filled seven hampers," Yerger said Monday.
Last year on the Monday after the pickup, post offices reported they had collected more than 30,000 pounds of food throughout the county.
As of Monday afternoon, participating post offices reported collecting the following amounts of food: Pottsville, about 15,600 pounds; Shenandoah, 3,750; Cressona, 1,100; Orwigsburg, 2,100; Port Carbon, 800; Saint Clair, 500; Minersville, 2,680; New Ringgold, 500; and Ringtown, 250.
Numbers for Frackville, New Philadelphia and Schuylkill Haven were not available Monday.
"Those are all the numbers we have as of right now," Lentz said Monday afternoon.
Greg Andregic, coordinator of the drive for Schuylkill County and union steward of the National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 500, based in Harrisburg, said last week that food collected in Pottsville, Cressona, Port Carbon and New Philadelphia will be given to the Salvation Army in Pottsville and Schuylkill Community Action.
The Salvation Army Pottsville Corps at 400 Sanderson St. will receive about 75 percent of that food due to its involvement in the drive and the community.
Every month, 80 to 100 families get food at its pantry, which is open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday to Thursday, Tammy Hench, captain of the Salvation Army of Pottsville, said last week.
The remainder collected by the Pottsville Post Office will be given to Schuylkill Community Action, Pottsville, which will pass the donations on to the Pottsville Food Pantry located at the Roundhouse, 400 N. Seventh St., Jason Schally, SCA's program operations specialist, said Monday.
Donations collected in the other municipalities will stay in their respective areas.
There are 18 food pantries in the county.
"We truly appreciate the influx of food during times like this, the less-busy season," Schally said Monday while loading boxes of food onto SCA's new refrigerated delivery truck. "During Thanksgiving, for example, we're busy as could be and we hear from everyone. Around now, we don't hear much about food-drive donations. It's a great time to hold Stamp Out Hunger, and we appreciate the dedication of the letter carriers for all the work they put in. It's not an easy thing to go door to door and accept food and bring it back to a central location."
The 22nd annual Stamp Out Hunger drive was coordinated by the National Association of Letter Carriers in conjunction with state, local and national organizations such as the United Way, Campbell Soup Co. and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association, according to a press release from the association.
Neither Andregic nor representatives of the National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 500 could be reached for comment Monday.