Food Bank of Lincoln running low on food

Posted By: Alden German
agerman@klkntv.com

For twenty years, the Food Bank of Lincoln has been working to ensure fewer people are hungry in 16 southeast Nebraska counties. From July 2017 to June 2018, the Food Bank had nearly 45 thousand volunteer hours and provided nearly ten million meals for southeast Nebraskans.

Right now, that’s proving to be a bit of a challenge. The Food Bank has 50,000 fewer pounds of food than normal for this time of year. Food donations are naturally lower in the late summer, but this current downturn has them cutting back.

"We’re able to continue to feed people but we do start to get a bit concerned at this point. We do cut back on the amounts because if it’s not there, we can’t provide it," said Michaella Kumke of Food Bank of Lincoln.

Nearly 59,000 people in southeast Nebraska are food insecure, which includes nearly 19,000 children 18-years-old and under. In Lancaster County alone, nearly 41,000 people are hungry. Nearly 12.5 thousand of them are 18-years-old and younger.

The Food Bank of Lincoln was fortunate enough to receive a $10,000 donation from rock band, Metallica when they visited the capitol city. That’s enough money to provide around 30,000 meals

If you’d like to make a donation, they accept food and money, and make sure every dollar goes as far as it can.

"For every one dollar that’s donated to the Food Bank of Lincoln we can turn that into three meals. We’re able to make that dollar stretch," said Kumke.

September is Hunger Action Month and the Food Bank is holding multiple events to collect food for the hungry. Their hope is their shelves will be re-stocked sooner than later. To learn more about Hunger Action Month, visit the Food Bank’s website that has a list of events here: http://www.lincolnfoodbank.org/events_entry.php?ID=550 .

To see how you can help the Food Bank at any time of year, click these links: 
http://www.lincolnfoodbank.org/most_needed.php
?https://secure.connections.net/foodbank.secure/donate.php