Posted on 11/22/2007 7:27:08 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
Operators of free food banks say they are seeing more working people needing assistance. The increased demand is outstripping supplies and forcing many pantries and food banks to cut portions.
Demand is being driven up by rising costs of food, housing, utilities, health care and gasoline, while food manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers are finding they have less surplus food to donate and government help has decreased, according to Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks.
"I've been doing this for 20 years, and I can't believe how much worse it gets month after month," she said.
Diana Blasingame has lately found herself having to go to a free food pantry once a month to feed herself and her teenage daughter.
"I'm pretty good at making things stretch as far as I can, but food is so high now and I have to have gas in my car to do my job," said Blasingame, 46, who earns $9 an hour as a home health aide. "I work full time, but I don't have health insurance and sometimes there just isn't enough to pay bills and buy food."
"We have food banks in virtually every city in the country, and what we are hearing is that they are all facing severe shortages with demand so high," Ross Fraser, a spokesman for America's Second Harvest — The Nation's Food Bank Network, the nation's largest hunger relief group, said Friday. "One of our food banks in Florida said demand is up 35 percent over this time last year."
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's annual hunger survey released Wednesday showed that more than 35.5 million people in the United States were hungry in 2006. While that number was about the same as the previous year, heads of food banks and pantries say many more people are seeking their assistance.
Tony Hall, vice president of the Food Bank of Southwest Georgia, estimates a 10 percent to 20 percent increase in demand for food in the 20-county area the organization serves. He cites cutbacks by local companies, rising fuel costs and the lingering impact of a March tornado that tore through Americus, Ga., destroying or damaging hundreds of homes.
"We really didn't rebound from that," Hall said Friday. "We're definitely down in donations. Each year the demand gets bigger and bigger."
Supplies are down to a little over 8 million pounds of food from a peak of about 12 million pounds two years ago at Hocking-Athens-Perry Community Action, which provides food bank services in 10 counties in southeast Ohio.
"We've lost factory jobs and many service jobs don't pay a livable wage," said Dick Stevens, director of the organization's food and nutrition division. "We see a lot of desperation in families who are trying to figure out how to pay higher fuel and utility costs and still put food on the table."
Most food banks and pantries aren't optimistic about the coming winter.
"November weather has been relatively mild, and you haven't seen the cost of home heating fuel added to what a family has to deal with," said Evelyn Behm, associate director of the Mid-Ohio Food Bank, which supplies food to pantries, soup kitchens and other charities in 20 central and eastern Ohio counties. "Those prices, we all know, are going up substantially this year."
At the Society of St. Vincent de Paul food pantry in Cincinnati, clients now get three or four days' worth of food instead of six or seven.
"We are trying to stretch our resources to help more people," said Liz Carter, executive director of the society. "But it's so difficult when you see the desperation and have to tell them you just don't have enough to give them what they need."
Officials with the Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York, which serves nearly 1,000 agencies in 23 counties, also are worried.
Through the end of August, the food bank was down almost 700,000 pounds of USDA commodities that include basic essentials such as canned fruit and vegetables and some meat — food that is very difficulty to make up in donations, Executive Director Mark Quandt said.
"We're bracing ourselves for a very tough winter, especially with home heating fuel prices at record highs in the Northeast," Quandt said. "People living in poverty or near poverty just can't sustain those types of increases."
$20 to fill an SUV?
GTFO! L0L
Oh.. you mean $80 a mo for a 5 mile commute..
yup, that sounds about right
That's aggravating, but don't give up. I work for a religious charity organization, and it happens. Most of the time, the person is mentally ill, and cannot think ahead. We feed approximately 25 people breakfast and lunch every day. All have some form of mental illness, and some walk as far as three miles every day to eat. Our food bank is inundated with turkey, so I have to figure out many different ways to fix it. Even so, the people are thankful. We fed over 100 people yesterday, and OT students served them, as well as socialized with them. Most have no socialization, much less know how to interact with people. I had no idea how many truly needy people there are. I'm talking about mostly unemployable people who got lost in the shuffle.
Nam Vet
Nope a Zuki, 95 model. Get 25+ mpg around town, 30+ in the summer. I drive all week before the gas guage even moves. SO about $60/month for gas. The house, more like 90 to 100 month for gas - but then the gas company has raised the rates 45% in the last two years. I cant live in the Zuki, no shower : )
I used to drive a Bug (old school) but the little Zukies with a 1600cc engine do the Bug a lot better - better milage, a heater that works (big deal here in Anchorage) and of course, 4X4. Oh, and an AM/FM radio.
Nam Vet
Yup, The VW’s were good cars but they had loose tolerances and wasted a bunch of energy compared to todays cars. The old beetle was like 20 Mph
I get 20 Mph from a dodge ram pick up
LOL! VW stories of the drive to grammas in the Catskills (no heat) are legend around here.
LOL
We drove a Bus (Kombi) and a bug for years and years. Had an ice scraper on the dash, so we could see out. You always dressed warmly to say the least.
On the plus side, the Vdubs did not have $800 “Engine Control Modules” that would fry if you gave someone a jumpstart.....
Best I ever got was with a pretty fresh 1600 in a 73 Safari (Thing with Bus componanats) was 25 mpg. And the 55 mph national speed limit was never an issue - I never had to worry about passing anyone.
LOL - I remember a guy in a mule cart passing us uphill, on the way to grandma’s...
ROTFLMAO
Not to mention — being blown off the road, smashed bugs on the rear window, use of a clock and not a speedometer and so on. But they were, at one time - inexpensive, easy to maintain and fun to drive - in a strapped to the hood like an Azrec sacrafice - sort of way.
Sell anything of late?
No sales - no writing, actually. too slammed with business.
Later - we are off to Mom’s!
Yikes! I'd be leery, too.
Balogney. Average is 16 miles each way. YOU are the exception.
“Another factor I read about in an article elsewhere is that FedGov is buying less food to prop up the farmers due to increased demand in the market. The gov donates this food (per the other article) - and this is a big factor for some food banks - they are receiving less from what may be one of the biggest “donors”.”
This is true. Our church food pantry gets stuff from the government, private business and individuals. The amount of food coming from the government is WAY, WAY down.
wow!
if we only had a socialist prez like hillary,
dat would be fixed, huh?
/s
My wife went to church this morning and helped feed a bunch of people. There’s no question these folks need assistance. It mostly comes from individuals and local stores, but there is some government food as well. But the government portion is way, way down, so the church is trying to make up the difference.
But the first a person has to have is the right attitude. Sometimes bad things happen to good people. In America you can get back on that horse and reach that goal better than anywhere else is the world. Period. SO NO FREAKING WHINING PLEASE!!!!
I agree that there are truly needy people who deserve assistance. However, it is the policy of the SVdP to investigate whether or not the people who come to them for help really are in need, otherwise it would quickly run out of money and would not be able to help anyone.
There was an opinion piece today in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, which was written by a guy who runs a food bank in Connecticut. He was complaining that just giving food away indiscriminately has created a cycle of dependency, which is correct. However, his solution is for the government to take over the work that is done by private charities and to provide free food, housing, health care, ad nauseum for the poor. He apparently does not think that this would create an even worse cycle of dependency, as Johnson’s Great Society program did. But perhaps he wants people to be dependent on government.
I’m not picking on SVDP. I shop there every week and donate often. However, I find it strange that they need a LARGER Food Pantry in just two years time when the Midwest has a very strong economy and low unemployment. And, By Golly, I’ve yet to see anyone dead from starvation in the streets with a distended belly and stick-thin arms and legs. ;)
Please understand; ‘The People’s Republik of Madistan’ IS a Sanctuary City. That explains a lot right there.
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