Thursday, November 28, 2019
www.plainvillecitizen.com
Volume 16, Number 43
A bountiful food drive: ‘People want to support people’ By Devin Leith-Yessian The Citizen
Recently, residents purchased a little extra for their neighbors while shopping at Gnazzo’s Food Center. The donations were collected by volunteers from community groups in town and loaded into the back of a 28foot U-Haul moving truck. The goods were then shipped over to the Plainville Community Food Pantry and unpacked by members of the Plainville Fire Company. One of the four central organizers of the fall food drive, Jeff Cedarfield, who volunteers through the Plainville United Methodist Church, said the food drive typically raises between 8,000 and 16,000 pounds of food, as well as cash donations which are used to purchase any items that come up short. The fundraiser ran from Friday, Nov. 22 through Tuesday and is sponsored by the church. “The thing that’s important is whether it’s 8,000 or 17,000 pounds … this town really supports itself,” Cedarfield said.
Volunteers standing by the entrance of Gnazzo’s handed out fliers with a shopping list of the most in-demand items at the food pantry and many shoppers came out with large boxes filled for their neighbors in need. In past years, Plainville natives have flown from faraway parts of the country to help supply the food drive truck. And some residents who are frequent shoppers at Gnazzo’s stop by the truck time and again to make donations. Pointing out the deli worker who has been making sandwiches for as long as the food drive has been going on, Cedarfield said Gnazzo’s is emblematic of this tightknit community. Being able to help the neighbors they see at the grocery store and around town makes the food drive special for many residents. “People want to support people — they want to support people close to them so they can feel the effect of the giving,” Cedarfield said. Food drive volunteers didn’t sleep in the back of the truck as they had during the first decade of the
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fundraiser, sustained by baked goods and space heaters supplied by Gnazzo’s, but Cedarfield said the effort still gets a lot of help from the grocery store. The food drive puts extra strain on workers rushing to keep discounted items on the pantry’s shopping list well-stocked, and right as the holiday rush was hitting. See Drive, A8
Thousands of pounds of food were collected.
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Plainville resident Philip Plourde, a volunteer with the Knights of Columbus, sorts donations to the Plainville Community Food Pantry during its annual fall food drive at Photos by Devin Leith-Yessian, The Citizen Gnazzo’s Food Center.