Along with Boy Scouts of America nationwide, area Scouts will demonstrate their slogan "do a good turn daily" Saturday, Sept. 25, by taking part in the annual Scouting for Food program. They will be placing door hangers with the date on local door knobs this week as reminders.

The goal of the community-wide good deed is to replenish the sparse shelves of area food banks, said Cindy Phillips, food chairman for the Cheyenne District of the Scouts’ Quivira Council. She hopes residents will remember those less fortunate.

Residents are asked to place a bag on their porch with sealed, non-perishable food items such as packaged meats, baby formula, and canned or boxed foods. Contributors are asked to place their food donations outside their homes by 8 a.m. on Sept. 25, when Scouts will begin their pick-up rounds.

The food will go directly to the local pantries in the 70 communities served by the Boy Scouts of Quivira Council.

"This is an opportunity for the Scouts to help others and make our neighborhoods better places to live," Phillips said. "It really gives the scouts a chance to put their slogan into practice."

The same effort is taking place in many of the 300 councils nationwide involving about 5 million scouts. It is a part of the BSA’s Do a Good Turn for America campaign.

Scouts in Great Bend will take what they gather to the Great Bend Food Bank. Scouts in outlying communities will either take the food to Great Bend or their local food banks.

In the past, Scouting for Food brought in up to 3,000 pounds of food for the Barton County Food Bank. Phillips said their goal is to do better this year.

Last year, Great Bend Scouts brought in 600 items. They are shooting for 1,000 this year.

According to the national BSA Web site, the first Scouting for Food collection was completed in 1988 and one million Scouts collected an estimated 65 million cans of food. As many as four million Scouts are expected to take part this year.

The Quivira Council encompasses 30 counties in south-central and southeast Kansas. It stretches from Kinsley to Iola and from La Crosse to Independence. The Cheyenne District includes all or part of Barton, Edwards, Pawnee, Reno, Rice, Rush and Stafford counties.

For more information, contact Phillips at 620-786-5827.