Martin's Additions Holds Manna Food Drive on MLK Day

The food drive is an annual tradition for the Village of Martin's Additions.

By Dick and Linda Kirschten Monday, Jan. 21, is Inauguration Day as well as the Martin Luther King Day of National Service. As it has for the last several years, the Village of Martin's Additions will be collecting shelf-stable food for Montgomery County's Manna Food Center. You'll find a donation table staffed by volunteers in front of the Brookville Supermarket (7027 Brookville Rd., Chevy Chase) on Monday. So, if you don't have time to volunteer your services to another cause, this provides an easy way to give back to the community. Cash donations also will be accepted and will be converted into non-perishable supplies for Manna within the week. Hope to see you there!

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Martin's Additions Hosts Manna Food Drive

Saturday is the last day of Montgomery County's Community Service Week.

By Dick and Linda Kirschten Saturday, Oct. 27, is the culmination of Montgomery County’s Community Service Week, an effort to get residents involved in an array of volunteer activities—economic, social, environmental and so on. If your busy schedule hasn’t given you and your family time to take part in any of the planned events, there’s still an opportunity to give back. On Saturday, from 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., the Village of Martin’s Additions will conduct a food drive, the proceeds of which will go to Manna Food Center, the county’s central food bank. Through its regular distribution program, Manna provides supplementary food to nearly 3,300 families each month at 14 locations throughout Montgomery County, as well as to institutions …

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Helping Neighbors in Need

With a still-stuttering economy, many Montgomery County residents remain at risk for going hungry. You can help make a difference!

By Dick and Linda Kirschten Want to contribute to the community but feel too pressed for time? Here’s an easy solution. Now in its fourth full year, the Village of Martin’s Additions Food Drive collects nonperishable items, and—twice each month—delivers them to the Manna Food Center, which serves the entirety of Montgomery County. There’s a handy donation box downstairs from the village office at 7013-B Brookville Rd., in the heart of the small commercial area. So, on your next shopping trip, pick up a few extra cans or boxes of food and drop them in the box on your way up or down Brookville. With a still-stuttering economy, many Montgomery County residents remain at risk for going hungry. And, you can help make a difference!

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Food Drive Suffers From Low Participation

Participation in the Village of Martin's Additions' food drive has fallen off in the past two months.

While more than 1,300 pounds of nonperishable food have been donated to the Village of Martin's Additions' food drive in 2012, participation has fallen off in the past two months, said Linda and Dick Kirschten, food drive coordinators, in an email to Patch. "Hunger remains a major problem, despite some signs of an economic uptick. And with prices at the pump eating into family budgets for other essentials, food assistance becomes even more important," the Kirschtens added. In fact, Montgomery County is one of the most expensive places to live in the country (as well as one of the richest counties in the country). "Families with young children in Montgomery County must earn at least $64,000 a year just to cover their basic needs without …

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Where To Give Back This Holiday Season

Churches, food banks and pantries around Montgomery County are collecting donations.

With the hectic nature of the holidays — from preparing meals to herding relatives — it's easy to forget that many of Montgomery County's families struggle to put food on the table.  If you're looking to lend a hand to your neighbors who can't afford holiday meals, here are a few of the county organizations accepting food donations: Countywide Manna Food Center — 9311 Gaither Road, Gaithersburg, Md., 301-424-1130 Manna distributes food all around Montgomery County and collects donations at its Gaithersburg warehouse. They accept donations Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and every second Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. You can find a wish list of food items on Manna’s website.  Kensington St. Paul's United Methodist Church — …

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A Family Affair

Local Food Drive Continues To Inspire

Organizers of the annual Greg Gannon Canned Food Drive are hoping to nearly double the drive's typical collection this year—to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Shrine of the Blessed Sacrament by helping those in need like never before.

This week, we debut a new format for our popular weekly family column, "A Family Affair." The column will be written on a rotating basis by the "Family Affair" columnists for the Bethesda, North Potomac-Darnestown and Chevy Chase Patches. This week, the column is written by Maura Mahoney, a freelance journalist and mother of three who lives in the Town of Somerset in Chevy Chase. If you’ve lived in the area for any amount of time, you’ve seen them. They appear on your front porch or doorstep in early December—brown paper grocery bags with a neatly typed request for canned food stapled to one side. Within a day or two, they disappear. The bags are a herald of the holiday season, and the hallmark of a special local tradition: the Greg Gannon…

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MLK Food Drive Pulls in a Quarter Ton of Donations

The event, part of the Village of Martin's Additions' yearly Manna Food Drive, drew substantial donations from local businesses and residents.

More than 500 pounds of food poured in on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day at a food drive event in the Village of Martin’s Additions. The occasion kicked off an annual year-long giving campaign for the Manna Food Center which the municipality first established three years ago. Last year the campaign brought in more than 5,000 pounds of goods, according to village manager Jean Sperling. Manning a food box and cash donation jar outside the Brookville Supermarket, volunteers collected $77 along with a wide array of canned and dried goods like baby food, pasta, and peanut butter for the event, Sperling said. Givers included local businesses like the Brookville Supermarket along with residents, who dropped off their contributions or called in …

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A Family Affair

Area Families Reach Out to Help Others

The 23rd annual Greg Gannon Canned Food Drive has another successful year.

Nearly 600 people participated in the 23rd annual Greg Gannon Canned Food Drive last Saturday. Many of the volunteers gathered bright and early outside the doors of the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament on the Washington, D.C. side of Chevy Chase. They braved the cold and enjoyed coffee, hot chocolate and doughnuts before heading inside to pick up T-shirts, receive final instructions, and take part in a brief prayer service. They then jumped into their cars to go out and collect cans and boxes of food from their neighbors. The drive's leaders divided up the area around the church into about 80 territories of 250 homes each, with two or three families covering each territory. During the week before the drive, the volunteers drop off bags…

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