John Covert is hopeful that his workload Saturday is much heavier than usual. While lots of his customers enjoy a day off, the Everett mail carrier will do double duty.

Like his peers across the country, Covert will pick up bags of donated groceries as he delivers mail. Saturday is the Nation

al Association of Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive. In 2010, the one-day drive collected more than 77 million pounds of food nationwide, about 2.6 million pounds of it in Washington state.

“This is the 19th year,” said Ernie Swanson, a U.S. Postal Service spokesman in Seattle.

“It’s a very good cause, and a warm feeling,” said Covert, a mail carrier for 21 years. When he sees customers on his south Everett route on food-drive day, he said, “I like opening the back of my truck and saying ‘Come on over and take a look.’

“Each mail truck holds enough to fill at least three shopping carts,” he said.

For Covert, fighting hunger is personal. “It brings back a memory,” he said. “I used the Everett Food Bank in the ’80s when I was young and broke. My roommate and I were just trying to get by on 30 hours of work a week,” he said.

Today his route includes a low-income housing complex. He has seen residents there generously give food. “In three more blocks, I’ll see homes where people are much more capable of giving — but don’t,” Covert said.

Leanne Geiger, director of food bank services for Volunteers of America-Western Washington, said half of all goods collected in food drives for the agency each year comes from the mail carrier drive.

Food collected Saturday will be distributed to 20 food banks in Snohomish County, Geiger said. In April, she said, 38,452 people in the county were served by VOA food banks.

High on the list of needs are baby items — disposable diapers, wipes, infant formula and baby food — plus canned meats, canned vegetables and fruits, soups and pasta, Geiger said.

Saturday’s drive comes as supplies from holiday season donations are dwindling. “This helps us get through the summertime,” Geiger said. Although many companies, schools and churches plan food drives in November and December, Geiger said VOA would like to see some efforts moved to September, when shelves aren’t well stocked.

Covert said Thursday that postal workers aren’t the only ones who’ll help fill food bank shelves.

“It’s more than the post office. It’s a big community effort,” he said. United Way of Snohomish County, Volunteers of America, many local unions, retired postal workers and families of postal workers, and other sponsors lend many hands, he said. What seems a one-day effort takes many months.

“We sign up every December to join the national food drive,” said Chris Kelly, coordinator of the local Branch 791 of the National Association of Letter Carriers. She works with Suzanne Moreau, Snohomish County director of the Puget Sound Labor Agency, on details that make the drive a success.

They arrange for plastic bags and reminder postcards to be distributed to customers, and for helpers and trucks to transport food after it’s brought back to post offices. Volunteers of America trucks are joined by volunteers with trucks from local Teamsters and the Hoglund Transfer Co.

“Some years we see an increase in food, sometimes it goes down a little bit,” Kelly said. In Snohomish County last year, about 390,000 pounds of food were collected. “This year we’re trying for 400,000,” she said.

As a mailman, Covert sometimes sees signs of hardships in households on his route. He makes a point not to snoop at mail, but he’s aware when people appear to have legal issues or overdue bills, or when they receive sympathy cards after a death in the family.

He’s happy for the chance to help — even if it means heavy lifting.

“Everything is measured by weight,” he said. “Cans are heavy. I joke about next year, please give noodles.”

Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; muhlstein@heraldnet.com.

Food drive Saturday

The National Association of Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive is scheduled for Saturday in Snohomish County and across the country. To donate, put nonperishable food items in a bag on your porch or next to your mailbox.

Food collected will benefit 20 food banks in Snohomish County. According to Volunteers of America-Western Washington, these items are greatly needed: diapers, baby wipes, infant formula and baby food; canned meats, fruits and vegetables and soups; and dry pasta.