Wondering when or where their next meal will come from on a day-to-day basis is a reality for more than 34 million people in America, with 9 million of those being children. Those numbers are hard to grapple with, and it’s estimated that nearly 1 million of those people facing hunger are located just in the Tampa Bay Area. Broken down that’s 1 in 6 adults, and 1 in 4 children that struggle with food insecurity.
It’s thanks to organizations like Feeding Tampa Bay that those in need have somewhere to turn. Feeding Tampa Bay has been supporting the community for 41 years, providing meals and on-site access to medical, financial, benefits access, grocery, and restaurant services that move people to personal capability. The organization relies on donations from individuals, foundations, philanthropists, corporations, community organizations, and local governments like Tam- pa and Hillsborough County. Approximately 95% of their food comes from donations and 3%- 5% is purchased. These donations help provide anywhere between 92 million and 150 million meals annually.
Shannon Oliviero, an External Affairs Officer for Feeding Tampa Bay stated that food banks are important to com- munities because “Food banks reduce hunger and help to build com- munities by rescuing food that would other- wise go to waste, pro- viding jobs on-site and job training for those with barriers to employment, Creates an over- all economic impact in their region. Above all food banks help make certain healthy foods available for those in need.
Food banks provide an abundance of assistance for people struggling but this wouldn’t be possible of course with- out the help of volun- teers. This year, Feed- ing Tampa Bay will see more than 50,000 volunteers support their mission
Another program that has been around since 2001 and has recently merged with Feed- ing Tampa Bay back in 2019 is the Trinity Café. The Trinity Café is a full-service meal restaurant that provides three meals a day to anyone in need. Volun- teers are vital to the pro- gram’s work. According to Jeremy Gloff who is the volunteer manager at Trinity Café, “Just like any restaurant you depend on the staff to run the facility… We have two locations and need thirty volunteers a day at each location.” Essentially without the help of volunteers, the support these programs provide for the community wouldn’t be possible. Geoff also stated that a lot of the volunteers are regulars who have been supporting the program for years as well as students, it’s a very diverse group.
Anyone 16 years or older can sign up and they even have volunteers that are in their nineties.