School group donates truckload of items to food pantry

Shelf after shelf lay bare. A few cans of salmon, jars of peanut butter and other donated items dotted the remaining shelves.

As he toured the pantry at the Action in Community Through Service building in Dumfries, pantry coordinator Michael Hinz remained optimistic. There was one more donation that would give the non-profit ACTS enough food to help those in need for two more weeks.

Lake Ridge Middle School’s Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) club donated a truckload of food and personal care items to the ACTS pantry on Thursday. Students hauled the boxes into Hinz’s truck in the rain.

“Bottom line, we wouldn’t be able to make it the next two weeks without their donation,” said Hinz.

Two weeks is a long time for the ACTS pantry to remain bare. It is a lifeline for individuals and families in Prince William County, Manassas and Manassas Park unable to afford food.

The pantry is part of the ACTS emergency assistance program, and serves more than 2,600 people every month — about 500 to 800 families. The pantry has seen a 26 percent increase in clients in recent months and a surge in those who make more money than the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s poverty guidelines. But many can’t afford to make ends meet.

Rebekah McGee, ACTS Emergency Assistance Program Director, pins the blame on the country’s recent economic downtown.

“It’s having a profound effect on our population,” said McGee.

There’s an increase in people needing assistance and a decrease in the amount of donations ACTS is receiving, McGee said.

While they rely on their monthly USDA donation, times are tough and ACTS is increasingly relying on donors like Lake Ridge Middle School, Smokey Bones restaurant and Bottom Dollar Food stores — ACTS’ main meat donor — to fill the pantry.

Susanne Cleary, the middle school’s FCCLA club sponsor, understands the dire need at ACTS. She mobilized a group of 120 rotating middle school students to raise donations for organizations like ACTS throughout Prince William County since 2002.

This month, Cleary and her students wasted no time launching their “Lucky Card Draw” to help fill the ACTS pantry, just a few weeks into the new school year.

Her ideas are simple, but effective: Bring in a can, get a card and you may win a free dessert at lunch.

This is just one gem in Cleary’s hat of marketing tricks. One year the club raised $1,400 selling candy grams at 50 cents a gram. The money was donated to a shelter for battered women and children in the county. It was used to redecorate a room at the shelter, which has since been dedicated to Lake Ridge Middle School — a Prince William public school first, according to Cleary.

FCCLA students form the backbone of the club’s public relations team. They make announcements on the school’s public address system and TV channel, and design event posters.

“The reason I go to FCCLA is because it’s fun being with Ms. Cleary and with my friends and I’m productive,” said veteran FCCLA student April Teale.

Others, like seventh-grader Eva Guantique, are just getting their feet wet.

“We get to help the homeless and I like helping out at the shelter,” Eva said.

Cleary’s philanthropic spirit is contagious. Some students say she is the reason they keep coming back to the club each year.

“While I was growing up I had this sense of community service,” Cleary said, her eyes welling up. Her father, an avid volunteer, set the bar high.

“He looked me right in the eye and said, ‘You can never do too much. You can’t always just take from your community you gotta give back.’ So that’s inside of me and that’s what the kids feel too.”

While ACTS never turns down a donation and works with clients to make the most of the donated food through recipe suggestions, the pantry is in need of dairy and meat. Unlike some pantries, the one at ACTS has added refrigerators and a walk-in freezer, which increases their ability to accept perishable donations.

The importance and urgency of what they are doing is not lost on the middle school students. Cleary recalls the reaction of twin sisters who volunteered at a shelter for battered women and children: “I can still remember, they came right to my door the next day and she said, ‘Oh Ms. Cleary, we could not stop smiling when we went to bed and I think I smiled in my dreams because I knew I did the right thing.’ ”

ACTS’ next major food drive is Operation Turkey, which will help feed families over Thanksgiving weekend. Donations are currently being accepted for this drive. For more information on how to donate to ACTS visit http://www.actspwc.org, or call 703-221-3186.