Annette Marcum sits in her Ben Lomond office every day making phone calls to service clubs, churches, food banks and her numerous contacts to coordinate the latest effort to provide for the least fortunate in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
It’s what Marcum has done each holiday season for the past 29 years as the founder and director of Valley Churches United Missions.
But Marcum does not tout her own efforts to feed the hungry. Instead, she points to the many volunteers and community groups that each year feed those who have lost jobs, suffered through the loss of a breadwinner or simply fallen on hard luck.
“This is an entire community effort,” Marcum said. “We’re supported by clubs, churches, youth groups, stores and all kinds of community groups.”
Marcum keeps detailed records that indicate already more than 49,500 volunteer hours have been spent on this year’s cause, as the annual Thanksgiving and Christmas project gets under way.
From Ben Lomond Market’s donations of holiday cheeses to help fill holiday baskets for 380 senior citizens to a $1 bill tucked in an envelope alongside a letter from a lady on a fixed income, people from every corner of the community pitch in.
“We’ve grown to this because people trust what we’re doing here, and it’s visible,” Marcum said.
The list of helpers is long. Churches fill bags with nonperishable food and serve up fundraising meals, Henfling’s Tavern hosts benefit concerts, grocery stores offer space for barrels and bags, service clubs collect food and money, and the local schools compete for the annual “Grand Can” award by gathering in the most canned food.
Though the nonprofit is not a religious entity, churches and community groups are some of its biggest supporters.
The recent 11th annual St. John’s Catholic Church spaghetti dinner sold out and raised $2,800 for Valley Churches United Missions.
The church’s seventh- and eighth-grade youth group, led by Bob Farwell, is setting aside cans and bottles to recycle for cash in hopes of raising $500 to buy gift certificates for fellow adolescents whose families cannot buy gifts for Christmas. Farwell said the experience is good for the youth group kids.
“It teaches them stewardship in the community,” he said.
If VCUM runs low on food donations, organizers purchase what’s needed with money that people mail to the nonprofit. The food is bought from Second Harvest Food Bank at a discounted rate.
All Valley Churches’ clients are from Scotts Valley and the San Lorenzo Valley. Anyone who falls into trouble can call or stop by with identification and will be served, sometimes with help paying an electric bill, other times with a week’s worth of canned food.
On one day last week, 40 new people went to the nonprofit’s Ben Lomond headquarters asking for help.
“These people have used up every bit of their resources before they come to us,” Marcum said. “We’re giving hope where there is no hope.”
Donations can be dropped off from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays at Valley Churches United Mission’s headquarters, 9400 Highway 9, in Ben Lomond. Food or money can also be taken to the Scotts Valley Chamber of Commerce, 360 Kings Village Road, from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Monday through Friday; or to Ben Lomond Gas Station, 9500 Highway 9, between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. daily.
