Food drive hits homes

Dozens of high school students will blanket two Newport-Mesa neighborhoods today in an effort to ensure the cupboard isn’t bare at a local food pantry.

Students from Estancia High School’s Associated Student Body will gather food donations in Costa Mesa’s Mesa Verde neighborhood, and several Mater Dei students will canvass Balboa Island for food as well.

Between them, they’ll visit 2,900 homes, and everything they collect will go to Friends in Service to Humanity Harbor Area, a Newport Beach-based charity that provides emergency help with rent and utilities, home-delivered meals for the elderly and groceries for needy families.

After collecting food in the school, they delivered bags on Wednesday to 1,500 homes in Mesa Verde, said Associated Student Body President Carolina Barnes, a senior at Estancia.

“This is our first time doing it, so I think we’re just kind of testing the waters,” she said. “It was tough taking bags to all of Mesa Verde.”

Estancia students will collect the food bags today. Meanwhile on Balboa Island, Lindsay and Michael Brown, who attend Mater Dei High School in Santa Ana, will enlist classmates and relatives to visit the island’s 1,400 homes to gather food.

Whatever the students bring in is much needed in the area, said Dana Timmermans, executive director of Friends in Service to Humanity Harbor Area.dpt.04-fooddrive-BPhotoInfoAO1OK0KU20060304ivl0pbknDON LEACH / DAILY PILOT(LA)Members of Estancia High School’s Associated Student Body plan their community food-drive project, which will collect food today.