GAINESVILLE - Thanks to the community's response, one charitable organization says it has plenty of food to serve people in need this Thanksgiving.

St. Francis House is already in the midst of preparing turkey for the 400 to 500 people expected to eat their Thanksgiving meal there.

Staff say that's because of the generosity of the community. 

With two freezers full of turkeys, staff says they're well stocked to serve Thursday's Thanksgiving meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans and fruit coctail.

Almost two-thirds of what's in their Thanksgiving food pantry was given to them over the last two weeks in response to the call for help they put out in radio ads and press releases to the community.

Additionally, staff say they grew from having only six turkeys to two freezers full of turkeys in the past 10 days.

However, while donations will take them through Thanksgiving, staff say they are still in need.

"Recently, we had the storms up in the Northeast," said Lee Smith, director of operations at St. Francis House. "That deflected a lot of the charitable giving, as well it should have. But of course, it does put a hurting on us and there's a shortage of financial funds."

Smith says while financial donations are the number one need, they welcome community members to donte traditional Thanksgiving sides: green beans, yams, stuffing mix and mashed potatoe mix.

Visit St. Francis's House website for more information about making donations.