By Michael Wacht

PUNTA GORDA — Members of Friendship United Methodist Church here and other volunteers collected more than 86,000 pounds of citrus from back yards throughout the community during a three-day period last month. Less than a week later, that fruit was delivered to food banks in Florida and Butner, N.C., said the Rev. Ron De Genaro, pastor of the Friendship church.

This is the fourth year the church has participated in the Society of St. Andrew’s (SoSA) Backyard Gleaning program. The goal is to collect citrus from trees in people’s back yards, then give it to feeding programs, according to Dick Mead, SoSA’s Florida state regional director.

"Most people have eaten all [the fruit] they can, they’ve given away all they can, and this is the stuff that’s left over," he said. "This is the stuff nobody wants."

But the fruit is wanted in places like North Carolina, Mead said, where floods caused by last year’s Hurricane Floyd and recent ice storms have intensified a need that was already there.

Not only is the citrus helping people in other states, the citrus drive is also bearing fruit at the 170-member church, according to De Genaro.

"It has become very much a tradition of this church," he said. "It makes people feel good to be involved in a mission project where they can see the actual results."

When the church first got involved four years ago, De Genaro said members set up collection bins for people who could pick their own fruit and drop it off. Volunteer teams were also sent out to help those who could not.

"We have 20 to 25 from our church who actually sign up to pick…10 who go out and do it everyday," De Genaro said. "We’re talking 80-year-olds who are doing this and loving it."

At the end of the first citrus drive they had filled the trailer SoSA sent them and had to rent the largest U-Haul truck available to move 12,000 pounds of fruit to the collection point in Ft. Myers.

Their collection increases with each drive.

"The goal this year was 40,000 pounds," De Genaro said. "…after one day of picking and three days of dropping off, we had to order in a second truck because we’d met our goal already."

De Genaro says the church has benefited from being involved in the citrus drive.

"The first thing reaching out to the larger community has done is it helped the congregation see the world outside their four walls," he said. "It has reminded them of their responsibilities and helped them see the bigger world."