'It makes me feel good:' LI volunteers say delivering food to the needy is its own reward

The days before Thanksgiving are among the busiest of the year for Long Island Cares, the food bank that relies largely on Long Islanders who volunteer to distribute 13 million meals a year to their hungry neighbors.

Anywhere from 30 to 40 people volunteer on a typical day, about 4,000 every year. Working primarily in two-hour shifts, they sort and package tons of food at the food bank's Hauppauge warehouse, then distribute it to food assistance agencies, LI Cares’ own pantries or its farm truck, which delivers free, fresh produce to sites across the region. Over two days last week, they distributed 150,000 pounds of turkey and other food to 300 partner agencies.

The volunteers' work was all the more important this year, when federal cuts "resulted in a 20% reduction of food we get" from