Christmas Express wraps up collection of canned food
Published 4:00 pm Wednesday, December 16, 2020
- Cans of food fill donation bins on Dec. 5, 2020, outside of the Hermiston Community Center. The National Honor Society and Key Club from Irrigon High School are hosting an activity night and food drive to support the Irrigon Food Pantry on Jan. 18, 2024, at the Irrigon Event Pavilion.
HERMISTON — Hermiston Police Department has completed its collection of canned food donations for Christmas Express.
The annual program, in its 52nd year, provides boxes of food and gifts to hundreds of households in need.
Police Chief Jason Edmiston said on Monday, Dec. 14, that in the end the department collected about 90% of the nonperishable food it normally does. Monetary donations were up by about 40%, however, which helped cover the approximately $6,000 more than usual the department had to spend on food, in part due to problem the department ran into when soliciting grocery store bids for turkeys and other food used to fill out the boxes.
Much of the food usually comes from large food drive competitions between classrooms at Hermiston’s schools. This year, with almost all students learning from home, the department set up a collection point outside Hermiston Community Center instead. More than halfway through the two-week collection period, Mayor David Drotzmann posted a plea to Facebook stating that the police department had only collected about 20% of its usual haul.
People came through in the last few days, however, including major donations from Umatilla Electric Cooperative and Hermiston Christian Center that had been holding drives of their own. Overall, Edmiston told the city council on Dec. 14, he was “very happy” that donations had come in as high as they had in such a challenging year.
The city puts together 500 boxes each year to donate to households referred to the program by the schools, social services agencies and other local groups that are aware of what families might be struggling. Edmiston said despite the obvious levels of need in the community, referrals for the program were actually down 20%, suggesting that local agencies had not been able to check in with families as much as normal due to the pandemic.
Any leftover food the city might have from the program will simply be added to the Agape House’s food bank to be given out to visitors in January, he said.
City staff put donations together into boxes on Tuesday, Dec. 15, and the boxes will then be taken to the Agape House, where people who have been notified they have a box waiting for them will be able to pick one up.
