Nashville food banks shifting strategies to meet growing demand

Nashville food banks are being pushed to their limits with people needing help now more than ever before.

Over the past couple of years, demand has skyrocketed at The Branch because of higher grocery prices.

Angie Thomas said they now serve more than 1,200 families per month. There was a constant line of cars outside of the building on Wednesday for their senior food box giveaway.

“We have a heart for this community,” Thomas said. “We want this community to thrive. When we are able to provide something that our community needs, like food, like English language classes, like entrepreneur classes, we feel like we are doing what we are supposed to be doing.”

The Branch currently has more than 400 volunteers per month, but Thomas said they need a lot more help to shift back to their pre-pandemic model that allowed people to come into the warehouse and select items off the shelves.

They are hoping to start that again early next year, Thomas said. Volunteers currently work to sort food into carts inside the facility and then bring them outside and load them into cars.

Thomas said they also need more donations to keep up with their constantly growing list of families. A $25 donation allows them to provide more than $300 with of food to people like Deborah Grissom.

“They fill the need,” Grissom said. “They fill that gap, especially when you are on social security and your funds are limited. You have to eat. You have to do your laundry. This is just such a great benefit for seniors and people that need the extra help.”

What annoys me is the persistent cry that SS and Medicare are "broke" when they are actually carrying the weight of the entire system.

Now that does not mean that I like them, I think financially they are a raw deal for all who pay into them. I would like to see them gone. But if they were only paying for the things that people are told they are used for they would be solvent.

But they have raided the funds since the beginning to pay for other things. Mostly buying votes.

It is like with the Roads and Bridges funds that come from the gas tax. Sure it is a pain but if it were just used for roads and bridges we would have the best roads and bridges in the world. Not quite paved with gold but gold is not a good road material in any case.

Instead the money gets dumped into the general fund and then it is used for everything BUT what people are told it would be used for.

If we are to fix things, and I do think it is fixable it would just take having the will to do it, one of the things we must do is insure that any tax that is purported to be for something is spent only on that thing. Nothing else.

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