You Make a Difference: Tom, Carolyn Lynch

Carolyn and Tom Lynch helped the Hopatcong Woman's Club collect 3,062 pounds of food in 2011.

On Wednesday night, the pair picked up something for themselves.

Mayor Sylvia Petillo presented the couple with the borough's You Make a Difference Award in a municipal building courtroom packed with friends during a council meeting.

"So while most of us are winding down on Friday afternoons," Petillo said, "Tom and Carolyn are driving around from one location to another location, picking up food from the donation buckets and delivering them to the food bank."

Tom, 83, and Carolyn, 78, pick up the goods from several spots around the borough each week. The club's donation buckets can be found in Hopatcong at Sovereign Bank, the municipal building and the post office and in Landing at the Hopatcong Family Practice.

"I see them all the time," Petillo said. "Whether it's raining or it's snowing they show up and make sure those buckets are cleared."

Petillo said Hopatcong has many unsung volunteers.

"During the year it's amazing to see the different volunteers that come in," she said, "and the things that people do that you don't even realize."

The club started the collections six years ago as part of the New Jersey State Federation of Women's Clubs initiative. But when the statewide effort ended after two years, the club continued collecting food, which gets donated to the Save The People food bank at West Side United Methodist Church in Hopatcong.

Click here to read more about Tom and Carolyn Lynch.