LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — Since 1994, God’s Pantry has worked to make certain that no one is left wondering how they’ll feed themselves or their families during Thanksgiving.
On Monday, Pantry employees, along with about 50 volunteers, began the process of getting roughly 68,000 turkey dinner meals into the hands of the 8,500 families who had registered for this type of help.
“It ensures that households that might not have a Thanksgiving meal now have a Thanksgiving meal to congregate with loved ones over food, over good conversation, and to think about the path forward and how to get there,” said God’s Pantry CEO Michael Halligan of his organization’s “Sharing Thanksgiving” initiative.
Michael says that in eastern Kentucky alone, the food insecurity rate is currently at about 17% of the population. And it’s not only a concern during the holiday season. Halligan and his staff work year-round to ensure that anyone who needs a meal can get one. Due to its popularity, this event required a registration process that opened two months ago.
“Every individual, every household behind me, is pre-registered so we can make sure those who need food for Thanksgiving get food for Thanksgiving,” Halligan explained.
Meals are boxed and bagged, and with the turkey, are packed into cars by volunteers as people drive up to get their meals. Tami Damron came to get 22 of those meals for her clients.
“A lot of the households we serve live on fixed incomes, disability incomes of around $1,000 a month,” Damron said. “Buying this food themselves would easily be 10 percent of their income, so it really lifts a burden,” said Damron, who works as the Associate Executive Director of AVOL, which serves the medically vulnerable with housing and other care.
Halligan said this holiday season might require his staff to provide for more people than ever before.
“Over the last 18 months, we’ve seen a 20% increase in demand for food access. Some of that is previous inflationary pressures, but there’s a lot of reasons for that,” he said.
It makes it a very good thing that there are a lot of people here to help.
“We have more than 5,000 volunteers donating about 35,000 hours of service. That’s what makes this work,” Halligan said before noting that God’s Pantry serves anyone in need throughout the year.
If you know of anyone dealing with food insecurity, click here for more information and support: Find a Pantry | God's Pantry Food Bank
