By Will Colette
When school is out, the food safety net for many working
families disappears. Without school lunch or breakfast programs, hard-pressed
families have to figure out new ways to feed the kids on their own.
For many families where the breadwinners are out of work and
out of benefits, there is no place left to turn but local food banks, such as
Charlestown’s RI-CAN, the WARM Center, Jonnycake Center and local churches.
They have all be reporting record increases in the number of families needing help as jobs remain scarce and unemployment benefits either expire or get cut.
For years, local anti-hunger groups have been backed up by
the Rhode Island Food Bank which has turned the task of coming up with the
large quantities of food needed to feed Rhode Island’s hungry into both an art
and a science.
But during the summer months, people get distracted and
donations can be spotty. For that reason, the Rhode Island Community Food Bank
has teamed up with several local businesses to boost collections of food though
its Summer Food Drive.
You can help both with financial donations and with
donations of food. To find out what you can do to prevent hunger in Rhode Island this
summer, click here. http://www.rifoodbank.org/DefaultPermissions/SummerFoodDrive/tabid/241/Default.aspx
