This is a hard time for most of us, we are shorter on cash than we are used to. Most of us, however, are lucky enough to have a place to live and enough to eat. It's important to remember that our local food banks help families ALL YEAR LONG, not just at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Can you take a moment to clean out your cupboards or pantry? Maybe donate $15-20 bucks and make your coffee at home instead of visiting Starbucks this month? Every little bit makes a difference!
Here's what I read in the Contra Costa Times, written by Tanya Rose:
The Monument Crisis Center, a Concord food pantry that serves 5,000 people a month, was forced to close its doors this week after it ran out of food to give away.
Sara Loquin, assistant program manager for the five-year-old pantry, said the hope is to get sufficient food donations, and to buy food at good prices, to be able to reopen Monday.
"We closed early Tuesday because we ran out of food - there is just nothing on the shelves here," Loquin said.
The nonprofit emergency pantry relies on food and cash donations from the community and from businesses to feed more than 1,600 families.
Despite continued support from community food drives and from large corporate donations, food reserves have been low since last year's Thanksgiving-Christmas holiday season, Loquin said.
At the same time, more people are coming through the doors each day asking for bags of groceries because of the ailing economy, she said.
"More individuals are losing their homes, jobs and spirits, and thus are coming to food pantries for help," said Sandra Scherer, the center's executive director.
Last week alone, she said, the pantry gave food to 75 families, and Scherer expects that number to rise each week.
Both women said they hope publicity about the center's plight will result in donations this week.
The center is located at 2350 Monument Blvd. To donate food or other resources, call 925-825-7751.
According to my mother, Terrylynn Fisher, who is a regular supporter of the Crisis Center, this seems to happen yearly around this time, I guess people just run out of steam of forget. So let's take some time to help those less fortunate. No one should go hungry. Thanks!
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