The Chattanooga Area Food Bank will be able to complement its Sack Pack Program with a School Mobile Pantry Program thanks to a recent partnership with the Arby’s Foundation. Sack Packs are given to food insecure children at many schools across our twenty counties. The $15,000 Arby’s Foundation grant will enable the CAFB to expand the Walker County Sack Pack Program during the 2015-2016 school year to also include school mobile pantries that will provide students and their families with fresh produce.
In Walker County, Georgia, over 4,490 children are unsure where their next meal will come from.
That means 28% of the child population in Walker County is struggling with hunger, well above the 22.5% national average. With Arby’s $15,000 contribution, CAFB will distribute food to Walker County children and their families through school mobile pantries. These pantries help to decrease hunger and increase the amount of nutritious food distributed. At each school mobile pantry, each child will receive thirty-two pounds of food, twenty pounds of which will be fresh produce. With Arby’s help, the CAFB can provide 41,280 pounds of nutritious food to approximately 430 school children throughout the 2015-2016 school year.
“We are thankful for the support from the Arby’s Foundation to reduce childhood hunger through our School Mobile Pantry Program,” said Marisa Ogles, CAFB director of development. “Partners like Arby’s are helping the Chattanooga Area Food Bank feed hundreds of children and allow them to enjoy fresh, nutritious foods they likely wouldn’t have access to otherwise.”