With the Thanksgiving holiday fast approaching, the Ballard Food Bank is hoping to provide 7,200 pounds of turkey to needy families and is seeking the public's help to reach that goal.

Each year, the agency's Adopt-a-Family program makes the holiday a little brighter for 40 to 50 families. Providing turkey dinners is an important part of the food bank's service during the holidays.

"With your help, the Ballard Food Bank will feed 600 families at the Thanksgiving holiday and we do our best to make it a special traditional meal for those who wouldn't have one otherwise," said Max Israel, president of the Board of Directors.

"For some families it makes a huge difference. It's a simple program and is pretty effective," said Operations Manager Tim McKenzie.

Individuals, churches and businesses are encouraged to take part in the program. The food bank pre-selects local families as recipients of home delivered holiday meals. Donors purchase all the groceries for a Thanksgiving dinner, then bring the food to the families themselves, enabling people to meet one another.

For Christmas, donors buy presents for the family's children to go with a dinner basket or grocery store gift certificate.

"It appeals to people. They can meet them face to face. They can meet and thank them for their help," said McKenzie.

The Ballard community has been generous in the past. Last Thanksgiving, the Ballard Safeway store helped feed 12 families. Our Redeemers Lutheran Church adopted over 15 families.

"It's just a wonderful opportunity for people to reach out and help neighbors a little bit," said McKenzie.

The Ballard Food Bank is also looking for donations of food for its regular clients.

"We try to build a holiday menu in the food bank line to help with the holiday dinner," said McKenzie.

Donations of turkeys have started to come into the agency. As turkey prices drop, a few people have been known to donate more than one bird.

When turkeys are available, they are given out to people lining up for food. Whole turkeys are only distributed to families of four people or more.

"In my experience, we have never been able to give everyone a turkey," said McKenzie.

Some may have to settle for frozen turkey hindquarters or hams from Food Lifeline or Northwest Harvest.

McKenzie says the other foods for a holiday feast are in short supply. Things like canned pumpkin, Jello, fruit cocktail, canned fruits, stuffing mix, cranberry sauce, celery, onions and other ingredients that go into the stuffing are in demand.

"The only way we can do that is to get enough support from the community," said McKenzie.

Some of the local grocery stores will have donation barrels. This year some locations participating in the Ballard Artwork on Saturday, Nov. 12 will accept food contributions.

"The Ballard Food Bank doesn't serve only those who can make it to our 24th Avenue location. There are over a hundred individuals and families who will receive their Thanksgiving dinner delivered to their door," said Israel.

The delivery service is for seniors and disabled people who are unable to leave their homes.

"Our delivery vans make weekly trips to them, bring fresh vegetables, meat, bread and other items that are available. For some, this is the only human contact they have in the week. We even prepare dozens of special bags for delivery each week for those with diabetes, allergies and other ailments," said Israel.

The Ballard Food Bank is growing and evolving to meet the needs of their clients. On December 13, the food bank's lunch program will move to the Calvary Lutheran Church Soup Kitchen with meals on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The Soup Kitchen will still hold its own Monday lunch service.

Last Thursday, the food bank's small lunch facility fed 225 people. A year ago the program averaged 145 people. Moving the lunch program to a bigger facility comes at a good time when more people are showing up hungry.

McKenzie said people have been turned away because the facility sometimes reaches its limits. At the Calvary Lutheran Church Soup Kitchen, clients won't have to stand outside waiting to get inside or eat meals outside like they sometimes do now.

In other news, a search firm has been hired to recruit candidates for the Ballard Food Bank's new executive director position.

In early December, the ten top applicants will be interviewed by the board of directors and the person hired for the job will start in January. McKenzie will stay on for several months to help with the transition period.

In the past, the community has donated money generously to the food bank during the last two months of the year. This season there has been a drop-off in contributions due to people giving money to help the Hurricane Katrina victims.

"Typically in November and December we get large amounts of donations. I hope our Ballard community was generous with Katrina and don't forget the Ballard Food Bank," said Israel.

To make a donation, the Ballard Food Bank is located at 7001 24th Ave. N.W., Seattle, WA 98177. Visit www.ballardfoodbank.org.