Patch Holiday Food Drive In Monmouth: Give To Feeding America

MONMOUTH COUNTY - Feeding America, the nation’s largest hunger relief organization, predicted this would happen as millions of Americans lost their jobs, their paychecks and even their businesses because of the coronavirus pandemic: Hunger is an urgent problem for about 68,000 people in Monmouth County.

You can help. Patch and Feeding America teamed up last summer to address the growing hunger crisis in America, connecting readers with the organization’s 200 member food banks that serve 60,000 food pantries and meal programs, and providing an easy way to donate money to help their neighbors.

Now through Dec. 31, we’re encouraging readers to make a tax-deductible contribution to Feeding America in the Patch Holiday Food Drive. Every $1 given to the organization buys 10 meals.

Local resources include:

• Cathedral Assembly By The Shore Pantry
• Center In Asbury Park
• Eatontown Food Co-op Pantry
• First Presbyterian Church of Manasquan Pantry
• First United Methodist Church of Belmar Pantry
• Food Bank of Monmouth
• Food Pantry-Atonement Lutheran Church
• Freehold Area Open Door
• Glad Tidings Pantry
• Greater Emmanuel of Howell Pantry
• Hope At Freehold Twp. Helping Other People Eat
• Hope Community Pantry
• Howell Emergency Food Pantry
• Keyport Ministerium Food Pantry
• Kitchen At St. Mark's
• Little Silver Food Pantry
• Lunch Break (Red Bank)
• Lutheran Church of Atonement Food Pantry
• Lutheran Church of the Reformation
• Open Door Freehold Food Pantry
• Presbyterian Church of Belmar Pantry
• St. Benedict Pantry Social Ministry Office
• St. Brigid's Food Pantry & Thrift Shop

Feeding America predicted last summer that 50 million people, including 17 million children, could face hunger by year’s end because of the pandemic. Feeding America projects the food insecurity rate in Monmouth County will rise to 11.7 percent in 2020, up from 7.1 percent in 2018.

In fact, according to Fulfill Food Bank's CEO and President Kim Guadagno, the nonprofit has seen a 40 percent increase in the demand for food since the start of the pandemic, having served 2.8 million more meals this year than in the same period last year.

"Pre-pandemic, Fulfill was feeding 136,000 people, including 50,000 children. Today, we are feeding 215,000 people, including 70,000 children," Guadagno said. "The cost of food has gone up exponentially since the start of the pandemic. A year ago, we paid $22,000 for a tractor trailer load of canned vegetable. Today, we’re paying $69,000."

Feeding America says that 80 percent of its food banks — or 4 in 5 — are serving more people than they were at the same time last year. With the pandemic worsening during the holiday season, many people who never before worried about how they’d pay for a holiday meal are turning to food banks for the first time.

“We have seen a continuous stream of more people on our [food pantry] line,” says Geralyn F. Drury, the acting director of Freehold Area Open Door. “In 2019 we served 363 families for Thanksgiving with dinner boxes and turkeys or hams. This year we served 539 families. Each month we are seeing well over 1,000 people.”

From the beginning of the pandemic in March, Feeding America distributed 4.2 billion meals — enough to provide every U.S. resident with breakfast, lunch and dinner for just over four days.

In the first four months of the pandemic, 4 in 10 people were first-time visitors to food banks, according to Feeding America.

Drury says that there are a great deal of tasks that volunteers can do during the holidays while remaining safe, such as no-contact delivery drivers for seniors and homebound clients. The Freehold Area Open Door also updates a "most needed" list for the food pantry for residents to donate needed items.

Yet another way that Monmouth County residents can help this season is through the pantry’s Change for Change project, which entails rolling and donating spare change.

“We need to get those coins back into rotation and it will be a way to clean out that junk drawer or container that is just sitting in your house,” Drury says. “We can provide service hours for students for this since we know volunteer opportunities are very limited.”

Patch has teamed with Feeding America to help raise awareness on behalf of the millions of Americans facing hunger. Feeding America, which supports 200 food banks across the country, estimates that in 2020, more than 50 million Americans will not have enough nutritious food to eat due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. This is a Patch social good project; Feeding America receives 100 percent of donations. Find out how you can donate in your community or find a food pantry near you.