Do you remember around Thanksgiving (and again at Christmas) when everyone was scrambling to find a place to volunteer? to serve meals ? to help the less fortunate?
Yesterday I had lunch with Estella Mayhue-Greer, Executive Director of the Mid-South Food Bank, who told me about the shortages they are currently experiencing. When a dollar was donated a few years back, they were able to leverage into $9 worth of food, but with rising costs, they are now only able to leverage it into $4 worth of food. What that means is a goal of providing 12 million tons of food fell short by about 2 million tons.
Mathmatics aside, what this means is more unemployed and hungry people create more demand for food when there is less food on the shelves. What we are facing is hungry families and hungry children.
So now that the weather is wonderful and our thoughts turn to gardening, sports, beaches, picnics, and more, we must remember that hunger is a year round problem. It is a problem just as heart wrenching in March and June and August as it is in November and December.
Please consider holding a canned food drive or contributing to an existing one. I am pleased to announce that my friends with the Greater Memphis Asian American Pacific Islander Task Force are holding a food drive on April 21 at 315 S. Hollywood (between the Children’s Museum and the Stadium) from 11:00 am – 3:00 pm. Please drive by and drop off a bag of canned goods. Or if you can’t make it out that day, go online to support the GMAAPI food drive www.midsouthfoodbank.org
