Food bank on verge of record-setting all-city drive

MARYSVILLE — Those looking to support the Marysville Community Food Bank through the annual All-City Food Drive still have a chance to break the event's records for food and money donations on Saturday, Nov. 14, when the Marysville Walmart sets out its big red barrels.

By Kirk Boxleitner • November 13, 2015 4:05 pm
From left
From left

MARYSVILLE — Those looking to support the Marysville Community Food Bank through the annual All-City Food Drive still have a chance to break the event’s records for food and money donations on Saturday, Nov. 14, when the Marysville Walmart sets out its big red barrels.

More than 200 volunteers from Scouts, Kiwanis, Soroptimist International, the Marysville and Lakewood school districts, the city and fire district of Marysville, HomeStreet Bank and several youth sports teams were manning red barrels at the Fred Meyer, Grocery Outlet, Haggen, Safeway and Albertsons stores in Marysville and Smokey Point Nov. 7.

Even without their collection at Walmart, which was postponed to avoid conflicting with a veterans’ collection drive that Saturday, this year’s food drive has already collected 5,781 pounds of food and an estimated $1,500 in cash and gift cards.

Food bank director Dell Deierling pointed out that last year’s drive collected 6,382 pounds of food and $1,901. The record for food collection is 6,589 pounds, which Deierling sees as easily beatable.

“What we need right now are turkeys,” said Deierling, who thanked local tribes for supplying grants to buy many of the turkeys. “Our goal is to give every family a turkey for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We achieved that last year, and we’re confident we can do it again.”

For the past two years, the number of families the food bank has served for Thanksgiving has held steady at about 700. Around Christmas, it’s usually closer to 625, and the food bank’s overall demand for this year has gone down by nearly 6 percent, but as Deierling warned, “That’s still a lot of need.”

Indeed, Deierling added that year-to-date food and financial donations are also down, while one out of every 10 Marysville and Tulalip residents uses the food bank at least once throughout the year. Last year, the food bank provided more than 14,660 families with groceries.

The food bank will be distributing Thanksgiving baskets from 9 a.m. to noon on Friday, Nov. 20, and Monday, Nov. 23, as well as from 2-6 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 24.