Post office delivers 8,000 pounds to food cupboards

By Stuart Hedstrom
Staff Writer

DOVER-FOXCROFT — Letter carriers working out of the Dover-Foxcroft post office picked up more than just out-going mail on Saturday, May 14 as they also collected yellow bags filled with non-perishables for the National Association of Letter Carriers’ annual Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive. Between the five rural routes, two city carriers and items dropped off in the post office lobby, 8,000 pounds of food was collected.

Observer photo/Stuart Hedstrom

STAMPING OUT HUNGER LOCALLY — U.S. Postal Service letter carriers Donna Leeman and Mike Henderson load boxes of food for the Dover-Foxcroft Area Food Cupboard collected through the National Association of Letter Carriers’ 24th annual Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive. A local record 8,000 pounds of food was collected, which will be distributed to the four cupboards in the four zip codes operating out of the Dover-Foxcroft post office.

Dover-Foxcroft Postmaster Loretta Dube said the 8,000 pounds is new a record for the town facility and about 1,500 more pounds than last year. She explained four zip codes operate out of Dover-Foxcroft “and all food collected in the zip code goes to that local food pantry, it does not leave the community.”

Dube said 3,910 pounds of food collected May 14 will be given to the Dover-Foxcroft Area Food Cupboard, which is housed at the Dover-Foxcroft Congregational Church. The Partnership Food Pantry in Guilford will receive 1,535 pounds, as will the Guilford United Methodist Church and another 1,520 pounds is for the First Universalist Church of Sangerville and Dover-Foxcroft.

“There was an incredible amount of food collected this year,” Dube said. “We have been doing this since 1992 and it’s sponsored by the National Association of Letter Carriers,” she said. Other national sponsors included the U.S. Postal Service, the National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association, United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, the United Way Worldwide, the AFL-CIO, Valpak and Valassis.

“We have a great time with it and everybody’s always very, very enthused about it,” Dube said, thanking letter carriers Mike Henderson, Donna Leeman and Stephen Provost.