Post Offices nationwide collecting food for annual donation drive

FAIRMONT – Over the next week, mail carriers will be hauling garbage bags and full boxes away from people’s porches as part of their daily delivery routes.

The content of these packages - non-perishable food items - will be delivered to local food pantries as part of a national food drive campaign organized by the U.S. Postal Service, with Fairmont’s also kicking off next week.

“Every office raises food for their local, so for us it’s any pantries here in Fairmont,” Tjuana Bassett, coordinator of the Marion County Post Office’s food drive, said. “It’s done in every major city in all of America. It’s sponsored by the National Association of Letter Carriers.”

Bassett has been coordinator of the drive in Marion County for five years, and said the efforts of the community have grown each year when it comes to donations.

“Six years ago when I first started, our donations came to about eight tons, and within the last few years, when we started getting bags and more sponsors, we have raised that to about 13 tons a year,” Bassett said. “We’ll have some people leave one bag, which is great, but some people will leave like huge trash bags, so it’s amazing what the community can do to come together for one day.”

Bassett said the donations will be given to organizations such as the Soup Opera, Scott’s Place, HOPE Inc., the Salvation Army and also local churches that distribute food items.

“As long as it’s in Marion County, our food drive raises for them,” Bassett said.

It was when she began carrying mail for the post office that Bassett first noticed the need for a drive like this. She would deliver mail to some of these food pantries and shelters daily, where she would never see the need cease.

“I come from a small town, so I didn’t realize how bad people were in homeless shelters because we don’t have that where I live,” Bassett said. “When I came here, I saw the amount of people who were at Scott’s Place daily and the Union Mission daily, because I deliver to those places. It just broke my heart.”

Mail boxes around the county will have an extra piece of mail next week for the drive, a plastic bag which can be filled with donation items for the carriers to pick up. The bag provides an obvious and helpful method of transport for the carriers, but Bassett said they will pick up anything that contains cans from a home.

“The carrier will pick it up and we have volunteers who drive around in the morning to pick it up,” Bassett said. “You can leave a can in your box, or you’ll get a bag about two days prior to the food drive and it’ll be left in their mailbox, they can leave the day of.

“Some people we have to send certain people out to get because they’ll leave boxes full of things,” Bassett said with a chuckle. “It’s great.”

Donors can also drop off items at any of the offices around the county before May 12, those being in Fairmont, Rivesville, Watson, Rachel, Idamay, Barrackville, Pleasant Valley, Farmington, Mannington and Monongah.

For more information on the drive, contact the Fairmont Post Office at 304 366-1610.

“Even if you donate just one can, anything goes,” Bassett said. “It’s not just donating, you’re literally helping people and helping families,” 

Email Eddie Trizzino at etrizzino@timeswv.com and follow him on Twitter @eddietimeswv.