At Lunch Break, we’re thankful for the recent attention given to organizations like ours – small nonprofits that feed hungry kids, families and seniors on a year-round basis.

On Thanksgiving Day, families throughout our area gathered around a table to share a hot meal and warm thanks for the blessings of the past year.

That’s what we’re doing at Lunch Break.

If you were to stop by Lunch Break on any weekday, you’d see our volunteers offering nutritious, well-balanced, hot meals to about 60 of our neighbors from the Red Bank area.

But Thanksgiving is the busiest day of the year at Lunch Break, with nearly 200 visitors enjoying a complete Thanksgiving meal at our little community center on Drs. James Parker Boulevard.

Who comes to Lunch Break on Thanksgiving Day? Young mothers with kids looking forward to an extra slice of pie, laborers enjoying a well-deserved day off, seniors getting out of the house to exchange stories with friends, families worried about a long, cold, expensive winter.

For those living in poverty right in our own neighborhoods, there’s much to fear as winter approaches. People working at least two jobs to cover their rent don’t know how they’ll pay for utilities. Seniors on limited incomes are deciding between filling their prescriptions and buying groceries. And single parents needing to put presents under the Christmas tree might need more than Santa’s help.

This holiday season, please consider supporting Lunch Break through a donation of food, toys, cash or time. For more details about Lunch Break, please call (732) 747-8577 or visit www.lunchbreak.org.

Lunch Break is proud to be “much more than a soup kitchen.” With help from the community, we’ve been able to feed the bodies and spirits of hungry neighbors for 22 years.

For this, Lunch Break is extremely thankful.

Dan Petrocelli

president, board of trustees

Lunch Break

Close call for the Atlantic coast

In mid-November, members of the U.S. Congress stripped harmful provisions from a budget reconciliation bill (HR 4241) that would have opened the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts to oil and gas drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS).

Several of New Jersey’s congressmen, including U.S. Reps. Frank LoBiondo (R-2), Jim Saxton (R-3), Christopher Smith (R-4), Mike Ferguson (R-7), and Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-11) played a pivotal role in removing language that threatened ocean waters, including off the Jersey Shore. Clean Ocean Action (COA) salutes those Republicans who were willing to challenge their leadership and vote to protect the nation’s shorelines. COA urges citizens to commend their U.S. representative for continuing to protect the ocean and its resources, as well as the industries that depend on a clean ocean, including the $31 billion coastal economy.

As written, the OCS provisions in the bill would have eliminated over two decades of moratoria protecting the ocean from oil and gas drilling. Specifically, the language would have given states the option to drill off their coasts and receive 50 percent of the revenues generated.

A key issue was that since states share ocean waters, those that chose to drill would have subjected neighboring states to potential pollution and devastating consequences. As an example, the coastlines of New York and New Jersey could suffer from pollution associated with drilling spills or accidents from states along the Atlantic coast.

The answers lie not in these risky and reckless offshore activities, but in tried and true solutions, such as conservation and the development of responsible, environmentally sound alternatives.

This is not a permanent victory, but offshore oil and gas drilling is off the table, for now. In this time of thanks, the elected officials that stood up for a cleaner ocean deserve a pat on the back.

Cindy Zipf

executive director

Clean Ocean Action

Sandy Hook

Elegy to keeper of local history

The recent passing of Tim McMahon, the Two Rivers area resident historian laureate and raconteur, has diminished the quality of life in our area by leaving a gaping hole in its social fabric.

From his vast storehouse of area facts, Tim gave greatly and willingly to the community he so loved, expecting nothing in return other than your interest and maybe a smile.

His personal wealth of knowledge of the area’s history and his ability to recall it on a moment’s notice was astounding and enthralling.

To have been so greatly informed, appreciated and respected by all who came in contact with Tim demonstrates that one need not be a CEO or a person of great financial wealth in order to be a valued member of the community.

Tim will be missed and remembered by his legions of friends.

Peter P. O’Such Jr.

Fair Haven

Job loss will mean economic woes

New Jersey lost nearly 5,000 jobs last month, the largest decline in employment in almost two years. These numbers, released from the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development recently, continue to spell trouble for working men and women in New Jersey, and the larger New Jersey economy.

As the new governor struggles with what is predicted to be at least a $5 billion deficit, I have a question for business, industry and political leaders throughout the state of New Jersey: What are you going to do when you run out of taxpayers to pay the bills and fund the government?

As our jobs continue to be shipped overseas and profit hungry corporations slash and burn what little security working men and women have, the net result will ultimately be that there will be no one to pay the bills upon which the engines of government and industry run.

Then, perhaps too late, people will begin to realize that changes need to be made.

Chip Gerrity

New Jersey I.B.E.W.

Hightstown