“Five more boxes! Five more boxes!” The words from Joe Katusich, the Martin Richard Foundation’s service leader, resounded over the chords of uplifting music inside the Leahy Holloran Community Center in Neponset on Sunday.

It was 2:28 p.m., two minutes before the scheduled closing celebration of the foundation’s autumn service program on a day when the foundation announced a $1 million grant to Project 351, an organization committed to developing the next generation of community-first service leaders. At the center, high-spirited volunteers, having worked for almost two hours, were finishing up sealing rice, corn, dried vegetables and powder into plastic film bags and packing the bags into paper boxes. And Carolyn Casey, founder and executive director of Project 351, an organization for youth service and leadership, was keeping a tally of the number of boxes packed on a piece of paper taped to the door.

The ingredients came from Meals of Hope, a Florida-based non-profit organization. Adding six cups of water to a bag will produce a meal of chicken flavored rice and vegetable soup.

Steve Popper, CEO and president of Meals of Hope, said that all the soup will be given out to the hungry by the end of the week.

About 200 volunteers of all ages, some of whom came with families and friends, some from community service organizations, and some from student groups, rotated working on four service projects, of which Meals of Hope was the largest.

Upstairs, volunteers from a Springfield organization called Square One packed cans of beans, pasta, gravy, baking mixes, instant potatoes, cranberry sauce, candies, and other Thanksgiving meal goods into black non-woven tote bags. At least 100 meals would later be trucked to Springfield and distributed to families in need.

Sam Paster, a 22-year-old Dorchester resident, said he had fun packing the goods. He said he has been volunteering for a few years with EPIC, which organizes young people with disabilities to do community services. For Sunday’s service event, about ten EPIC volunteers were on site.
The other two projects on Sunday were with Food for Free and Fresh Truck.

In the room for Food for Free, volunteers packed coffee, tea, creamer, and candies along with hand-written cards into storage bags. The Cambridge organization will deliver the 160 or so goodie bags to people who can’t access a traditional food pantry due to illness or disability.

Fresh Truck, a mobile fresh produce market, would bring 200 bags of produce to Grand Manor, a Boston pantry, that same day, said Raya Jackson, Fresh Truck’s program coordinator. Each bag contained two potatoes, one apple, one avocado, three bulbs of garlic, one onion, three bananas, one red pepper, and three tomatoes.

By 2:38 p.m., almost all tables in the large hall were cleared of boxes, funnels, and sealers and the floor had been swept. The volunteers then gathered in the hall for a game of “The Price is Right” as Casey crossed off the number 116 and wrote 120 above it. The number of meals in the boxes packed that day amounted to 52,242.

Sunday’s packing effort was the final service event of the Martin Richard Foundation, which is changing its focus to charitable giving. But Bill Richard, who co-founded the organization with his wife Denise, told the assembly that people could always find opportunities to serve.

“You don’t need organized service days to give back,” he said. “Thankfully we live in a location in Boston, in Dorchester, where there is always something going on. Stay tuned and seek out these opportunities, and find your own ways to make an impact.”

As to the grant to Project 351, the foundation’s largest commitment to one organization to date, Denise Richard said, “As we have partnered with Project 351 over the past five years, we have been inspired by their unique approach to motivating and developing young leaders through service across the Commonwealth.

“We know this grant will support their work not only in developing eighth graders, but also the Project 351 alumni who are so committed to moving forward as upstanders and changemakers for our world.”