Despite heavy rain on pickup day, this year’s Sunshine Coast Thanksgiving Food Drive was deemed a big success.
“The total amount of food collected for the food banks on the Coast was over 18,200 pounds – about nine tons,” coordinator Burns Matkin said. “This was down from last year, but we attribute that to the heavy rain on the pickup morning. Under any measure, this is very, very successful.”
Almost 100 volunteers donated their time for the project, placing the bags and then picking up the filled bags at the drive’s conclusion on Saturday, Sept. 17.
“That’s the hard part,” Matkin said. “The volunteers who picked up the bags got soaked but they stuck to it and we were done on time.”
About a dozen local businesses provided critical support, donating plastic bags, publicity and free transportation, and Chatelech Secondary School’s help with preparations made a real difference, allowing more time for bag delivery, Matkin said.
