The first thing we learned is that there are three different kinds of people that St Mary's helps: 4, 5 and 7. One in every four children in the Valley is hungry. One in every five adults, and one in every seven senior citizens. That's absolutely disgraceful. I was shocked.
Nonetheless, I won't cover the highlights of the presentation that Mr. Chet gave the group, in case you want to schedule a tour yourself. I will, however, say that Hunger 101 is their educational program for children. When I asked about age restrictions, I was told that it was St Mary's policy not to have kids younger than 5 attend. I'd take that further and say that it's best for upper elementary through high school age. There's a lot of talk, and a good amount of walking on the tour.
We went through the entire warehouse. It's huge. And hot during the summer. No air conditionning. The sheer volume of square feet and the amount of food that goes in and out of the building is amazing. The number of volunteer hours logged by volunteers is staggering....and yet, still more needs to be done.
The most interesting part of the warehouse tour for me was when we rounded the corner and left the community supported section of the food bank and went to the government funded section. Different rules and regulations, and yet another example of government waste and inefficiency. The community supported portion of St Mary's does everything about feeding the community better, cheaper and more efficiently than the government funded portion.
Finally, a plug for one of their fundraisers...My son and I each won these stuffed turkey characters, The tag attached to them says, "Buy-A-Bird Feed A Family". They'd make perfect gifts for friends and family who don't really need anything.
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