Boy Scouts Collect Food for the Hungry During Time of Critical Need
WHO: America’s Second Harvest of Wisconsin & Milwaukee County Boy Scouts
WHAT: Scouting for Food – Collection Day
WHEN: Saturday, March 28, 2009
WHERE: Media photo opportunity at the West Allis Farmers Market, between 10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. located at 1559 S. 65th Street (corner of 65th & National Avenue). (Uniformed Boy Scouts sorting and packing food.)
Milwaukee, Wis.- Scouting For Food is one of the largest one-day food drives benefiting Second Harvest. Boy Scouts will go door-to-door on Saturday, March 28, collecting “Scouting For Food” bags. This year’s effort will be particularly important since food donations are at a 10 year low and demand for food from the food bank is up 36%. “Emergency feeding programs are seeing many new people come through their doors for the first time. In fact, many of these programs are serving double the number of people they did six months to one year ago,” said Bonnie Bellehumeur, president of America’s Second Harvest of Wisconsin.
Residents in Milwaukee, Waukesha and Racine counties received Scouting For Food bags on their doorsteps last week. Scouting For Food bags were also inserted into the Sunday, March 22nd edition of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Residents are encouraged to fill the bag with nonperishable food items and leave it outside their front door on Saturday, March 28, before 9 a.m. for pickup. Desirable items include peanut butter, canned fruits and vegetables, canned meat, tuna, macaroni and cheese, canned soup and cereal. Residents can also drop off their bag of nonperishable food items at their local Pick ‘n Save store in the blue collection barrels. Food collected in Waukesha and Racine counties will benefit local food pantries in those communities.
Last year the Boy Scouts collected more than 184,000 pounds of food. Since 1987, the Boys Scouts have collected more than three million pounds of food for Second Harvest of Wisconsin, the state’s largest food bank. Scouting For Food is sponsored by Pick ‘n Save, Schneider National Trucking, US Corrugated, Waste Management, MATCO Distributors, Wisconsin Lift Truck and Ned’s Pizza.
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235,000
people in eastern Wisconsin rely on food supplied by America’s Second Harvest
of Wisconsin each year. The food
bank is the largest, private, non-profit distributor of food in the state.
Second Harvest Food Bank distributes nearly 11 million pounds of food annually
to 1,100 food pantries, meal programs and shelters throughout eastern
Wisconsin. Second Harvest Food
Bank is affiliated with Feeding America, formerly named America’s Second
Harvest, which is consistently ranked as one of the most efficient charities,
out of the country’s 100 largest charities, by Forbes magazine. Since 1982, America’s Second Harvest of
Wisconsin has distributed more than 200 million pounds of food. To learn more about hunger in
Wisconsin, log onto www.secondharvestwi.org.
