Canned good pyramids, cardboard carton towers, turkey-jammed freezers and carrot, potato, apple and turnip-bag mounds each year transform the Pawcatuck Neighborhood Center in Stonington into a bustling hub of activity in these days leading up to Thanksgiving. Volunteers ranging from Cub Scouts to retirees crowd into the center to help pack up and deliver holiday meals to neighbors whose budgets are stretched too thin.

This annual scene is repeated twice over in the weeks leading to Christmas. Truckloads of toys and warm winter clothing also are donated to the center in December. The abundance of donations and volunteerism are testament to the public's generosity to families whose holiday tables might otherwise appear as lean as Bob Cratchit's would have if old Scrooge had never been visited by those three lesson-laden ghosts.

The scene is repeated at other local social service agencies and charities as the public is gripped by holiday goodwill, generosity overflows.

While such beneficence always is welcome, the problem is that many agencies struggle to keep pace with client needs once the public packs away holiday lights and finished off the last of the turkey leftovers. Up until Christmas, for example, food donations regularly are dropped off at pantries throughout the region, but at other times of the year, many pantry shelves stand nearly devoid of non-perishable items.

Needs also extend well beyond food. Neighborhood Center Executive Director Vicki Anderson, for example, already is concerned about the agency's ability to meet 2015 demands for fuel assistance, especially if the winter proves to be another long and bitter one. The concern is deepened by state and federal cutbacks to fuel assistance programs.

New London's Homeless Hospitality Center has a continual demand for items such as warm socks and start-up sets of basic home goods for clients moving into new apartments. Safe Futures, formerly the Women's Center of Southeastern Connecticut, works year-round with victims of domestic abuse and, as such, is always helping women and their children settle into new homes. The agency keeps a wish list of items ranging from baby supplies and linens to lamps and vacuum cleaners posted on its website.

The most essential item so many service agencies seem always to find in short supply is money. Financial donations allow agencies to meet the most pressing of the ever-changing needs of their clients on any given day. To make donating easy, most agencies also have donation links on their websites. Some allow for monthly gifts to be automatically debited.

Making a child's Christmas special or ensuring a neighbor has a bounteous holiday meal is wonderful and encouraged. But even better? Pledge those neighbors year-round support this holiday season.