Students make big donation to Pine Island Food Pantry
Tuesday afternoon students from Pine Island Elementary School contributed more than a half ton of non-perishable food to the Pine Island Food Pantry.
“This is a remarkable annual gift that these kids do every year for the Food Pantry,” Dave Grueser said.
Tina Garris is the exceptional student education, academic enrichment and student science lab teacher at Pine Island Elementary and has been collecting food for the food pantry for 15 or 16 years.
“Our students at Pine Island Elementary are exceptional,” Garris said. “Every year the students collect non-perishable food for the pantry and this year they collected 1,132 non-perishable food items for their community. They really love doing it, they enjoy making a difference in their community because the community is so generous to us. This school is blessed by the people of Pine Island. The people of Pine Island really care about us and this is an opportunity for us to give back.”
The students collect cans and other non-perishables from home, from grandparents, from close friends and neighbors and bring them in.
The Pine Island Food Pantry has been in existence since 1995 and helps hundreds of families every year. Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Catholic Church has provided the Food Pantry with operation space in the Community Life Center as an ecumenical outreach program for the residents of Pine Island and Matlacha.
Grueser said there are locations throughout the community where individuals can drop off non-perishable donations.
Those locations include the American Legion, VFW, Stonegate Bank, Matlacha Post Office, the Moose Lodge and all of the churches on the island.
“No one should go hungry on the island,” he said.
Monetary donations can be sent to the Pine Island Food Pantry, 12175 Stringfellow Road, Bokeelia, FL 33922.