To help local food banks, U.S. Postal Service workers in Skagit and Island counties will collect food items donated by customers Saturday as part of the National Association of Letter Carriers Food Drive.

Carriers ask customers to place nonperishable food items next to their mailbox before their mail is delivered Saturday. The letter carrier will pick up the items and take them to the Post Office for sorting and delivery to local food banks.

The food drive is the largest annual single-day collection of nonperishables in the world. The 2007 drive collected more than 70 million pounds of food nationally.

An estimated 35 million people, including 12 million children, face hunger each day in the United States, according to the letter carriers union.
The letter carriers chose May for their annual drive because food bank donations tend to wane after the winter. However, union members say that national hunger problem is at its most critical during the summer when school breakfast and lunch programs are suspended.