Annual Turkey Drive continues through Saturday

MOSES LAKE — Employees at Moses Lake healthcare organizations are teaming up to help families in need have a better Thanksgiving. The annual Community Turkey Drive will continue Friday and Saturday.

Employees from Samaritan Healthcare, Moses Lake Community Health and Confluence Health-Moses Lake Clinic are volunteering to collect food and money at the Moses Lake Safeway, 601 S. Pioneer Way. All the food and money collected will be donated to the Moses Lake Food Bank. Volunteers will be on hand from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday and 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday.

The volunteers are collecting donations at the door, at tables inside the building, and the food bank’s truck at the back of the parking lot. “We’ll take donations of food or money,” said Stephanie Melcher, marketing director of Moses Lake Community Health. People who want to donate also can buy a voucher, or vouchers, at the registers. That money also is used to buy food.

“We each took a day,” Melcher said. And as part of the turkey drive “we’re having a friendly competition, to get as much (food and money) as possible.”

Turkeys are in the title, and volunteers definitely are accepting donations of turkeys, along with all the trimmings for Thanksgiving dinner. Volunteers are looking for donations of potatoes and fresh and canned vegetables, boxed stuffing, beef and chicken broth, cranberry sauce and canned pumpkin. Volunteers are taking donations of all other cans, boxes or bags of non-perishable food as well.

The turkey drive used to be a Samaritan Healthcare project, but about three years ago the three organizations started working together, Melcher said. Other sponsors are the Columbia Basin Herald, Safeway, Signs Now and KDRM Radio.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.