Teachers collect one ton of food for the needy

Art Holzmann beams with pride when displaying one of the vehicles chock full of food donated by teachers to the food pantry last week. ERIc GROSS For the fifteenth consecutive year, Brewster teachers have reached out to their community by collecting food for the less fortunate.

Vans, station wagons, and SUVs pulled up to the St. Andrew’s Church Food Pantry in Brewster last week and a small army of volunteers donated 2,125 pounds of non-perishable food items along with $205 in cash collected during the past couple of weeks.

Brewster School District Food Drive Coordinator Art Holzmann attributed the large response this year to an initiative undertaken between the food pantry and the teachers, in which a list was developed outlining the most needed and requested items.

Holzmann explained that the list was printed into a flyer and stapled to brown paper bags donated by the A&P in Southeast and Trader Joe’s in Danbury.

The bags were placed in mailboxes of staff members throughout the district, resulting in the very successful outcome.

Holzmann thanked a number of teacher volunteers for coordinating the food drive, including Rob Gallacher and Leslie Fine at Brewster High School, who not only collected the food but delivered 800 pounds to the pantry themselves.

Debbi Hvolbeck collected the food at the John F. Kennedy Elementary School while Sue Strain assisted at the Garden Street School.

C.V. Starr Intermediate School organizers were Daria Pascale and Christine Kayler, and at the Henry Wells Middle School Diane Starr and Melissa Lutz collected the food.

Holzmann also commended Brewster Middle School teacher Kathy Muentener for her efforts in helping to deliver more than 1,300 pounds of food to the pantry last week.

—Eric Gross