Elgin Lions kick off food drive at Lincoln Elementary

The Elgin Lions Club is conducting its annual food collection program to assist the Elgin Community Crisis Center and other charitable groups in their feeding programs.

The red collection barrels are showing up in many elementary schools in Elgin Area School District U-46, and now the program is reaching into Elgin High School.

On Oct. 26, Elgin Lion Ed Bates and club president Mary Merrell assisted in Lincoln Elementary School's kickoff of its food collection program at an all-school assembly.

The Hoffman Estates school has a laudable goal of 2,016 nonperishable food items to be collected during the month of November. Lincoln Elementary also does many charitable collections including "Penny Wars" and "Socktober."

The Lions Club assisted the students by transporting the new socks collected by the students to the Community Crisis Center (225 units) and PADS of Elgin (200 units).

The food drive is led by the Lincoln Elementary Student Council and several teachers at the school are involved in this program including Karen Peterson, Rudy Arreola, and Kristin Bayer. The assembly also involved numerous patriotic celebrations that followed the theme of the school's namesake, Abraham Lincoln.

The Elgin Lions Club is looking for new members. Anyone interested in giving something back to the community is welcome at the next meeting at 6:15 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 1, at the American Legion Hall, 820 N. Liberty St. in Elgin. For information, call (847) 289-4206 and leave a message.