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SALT LAKE CITY -- Boy Scouts from communities across Utah went door to door Saturday to pick up thousands of pounds of food for the Utah Food Bank.
The "Scouting for Food" program is the largest one-day food drive of the year. Earlier this week, empty bags were distributed for people to fill up with food.
Saturday, those bags were picked up, sorted and counted.
"They get excited about it," said David Kunz, the marketing director for the Great Salt Lake Council of the Boy Scouts. "They love coming out and finding as much food as they can and bringing it in for the needy."
Jim Pugh, executive director of the Utah Food Bank, says the event has a huge impact on communities. "To have a day like this where the scouts are taking time out of their schedules to drop off bags, pick those bags up, help with the store process -- they help all the way along," he said. "It's just a huge good turn to help the community."
Last year, the "Scouting for Food" drive brought in close to a million pounds of food for Utah's emergency food network. More than 500,000 pounds was delivered to the Utah Food Bank.
As of Saturday evening, the food bank had collected 500,000 pounds of food from the Salt Lake area alone and expected to meet it's statewide goal of one million pounds by the day's end.
