Officials from Second Harvest Food Bank of Clark, Champaign and Logan Counties estimate that 14.6 percent of Logan County residents are food insecure.
Food insecurity refers to the United States Department of Agriculture’s measure of lack of access, at times, to enough food for an active, healthy life for all household members and limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate foods.
Organizers of the 3rd annual Empty Bowls event from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday, May 5, in the Ohio Hi-Point Career Center cafeteria, hope to raise awareness of the situation and $5,000 to continue services to food insecure residents of Logan County while adding new programs to combat child hunger in the community.
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Bellefontaine High School students, from the left, Kaitlyn Bowman, Kierstin Diener and Hayden Nease glaze bowls for the Empty Bowls event. All 3D Art Level 2 and 3 classes made bowls. (PHOTO | BELLEFONTAINE HIGH SCHOOL) |
The Empty Bowls offers patrons a hand-crafted bowl — made by area residents, local high school students and Wittenberg University art students — in which they eat a simple meal of soup and bread from local restaurants and food providers for a $15 donation per person.
Food insecure households are not necessarily food insecure all the time.
Food insecurity may reflect a household’s need to make tradeoffs between important basic needs, such as housing or medical bills, and purchasing nutritionally adequate foods.
As the only food bank in the three counties it serves, Second Harvest distributes more than 6 million pounds of food annually, with more than 610,000 pounds going directly to benefit Logan County residents. This amount of food equates to more than 51,000 meals distributed to food insecure residents of Logan County.
The food bank’s daily operations consist of sourcing and gathering food, sorting and cataloging the food, then warehousing the inventory to be distributed to agency members throughout its service area.
Second Harvest Food Bank member agencies in Logan County include Buckeye Gospel Barn, Our Daily Bread, Five Loaves Food Pantry, St. Vincent de Paul Bellefontaine and Russells Point, Caring Friends, United Christian Services, Give & Take and Recovery Zone Bellefontaine. These agencies along with the Second Harvest Food Bank’s Mobile Pantry and Senior Commodities Food Program serve 7,000 Logan County residents annually.
“Empty Bowls is a wonderful way for Second Harvest Food Bank to bring the community together,” said Tyra Jackson, executive director of Second Harvest Food Bank.
“The event wouldn’t be possible without the support of local businesses, restaurants and individuals joining together in raising awareness to end hunger.”
For more information, contact Rose Bradley (937) 325-8715, ext. 133 or [email protected].