Students display can-do effort

Jolene Benedetti’s office wasn’t meant to hold two grocery store aisles’ worth of canned food, but for the last two weeks she had no choice.

Not that she’s minded, though.

In Newport Harbor High School’s seventh annual canned food drive, the community service coordinator’s office was inundated with nearly 7,000 cans of food, two to three times more than what they usually get. All the food this year is going to victims of the fires that scorched Southern California for more than a week in October. The fires burned more than half a million acres from Santa Barbara to the Mexican border, destroyed more than 2,000 homes, killed nearly a dozen people, injured more than 70 firefighters and displaced tens of thousands.

“I’m so blessed with my job,” Benedetti said, laughing. “It’s kind of like a hurdle walking in here, but we don’t care. You do what you got to do.”

America’s Second Harvest, one of the nation’s largest hunger-relief nonprofit organizations will pick up the food Monday, Benedetti said.

They might want to bring some extra barrels for the food.

“There are big tubs of cans everywhere,” said junior Mark Contreras, a teachers assistant in the career center. “The staff was really surprised. They didn’t think the students would donate so many. I think this is a good cause because it’s going to people in need.”

Students earned credits for community service hours for donating cans — five cans equals an hour of credit — with a maximum of five hours. The drive started on Monday, Nov. 5, and was supposed to end on that Friday.

“I’m still collecting, I wouldn’t turn them away,” Benedetti said. This year families came together and donated.

“This year was different because people saw the fires and go ‘Wow, this is so close to home.’ I think it’s in their heart and souls. This one really hit home.”

JOSEPH SERNA may be reached at (714) 966-4619 or at [email protected].