June 7, 2018 Meeting of West Bay Rotary

Buckets on the table for the month will be contributed to the Knox County Fund of the Maine Community Foundation.

 

Sherry Cobb, Area Interfaith Outreach, spoke regarding Hunger in Knox County. She came to speak about the Backpack program, which is focused on feeding children on the weekends. AIO is the Food Pantry in Rockland that serves all of Knox County and also provides emergency assistance with heating costs, up to $300 per year per household. 

They have a voucher desk and a food pantry. 3,200 families have been served since October, including over 8,000 people. 35% of households have children, 40% have at least one senior citizen. Many are having to choose whether to pay for food, utilities, rent or medical care. The rate of food insecurity is increasing and Maine's is higher than the national average (16.4% versus 13%). In Maine food insecurity has grown 20% in 10 years. Many of the people they serve are working families so they have hours beyond their 9:30a - 12p Monday-Wednesday-Friday weekday hours to accommodate them.  They see that demand goes down in the summer when employment rates are at their highest due to the tourist trade. She also spoke about Community Investors of Knox County which is an on-line resource for people who want to help families in difficult straits.  You can visit them on Facebook or write to knoxcommunityinvestors@gmail.com.  Their coalition of organizations vetting the requests include United Midcoast Charities, who is also the program's fiscal sponsor.  They get one request a week.

The percentage of children whose families qualify for free or reduced lunch are 50% at Oceanside Middle and 64% at South Elementary. Camden schools are 23%. 

The weekend backpack program started 3 years ago, and they put the packs together on Thursday morning and distribute them Friday. Food distributions from Good Shepherd Food Bank are delivered to Knowlton Van Lines, then distributed by truck to each of the food pantries every month.  Weekly volunteers pack more than 350 backpacks in about 35 minutes and they are then distributed to the various schools. In addition to the 17 schools they now serve in year three of their program,  they hope to expand to Appleton, Hope, Lincolnville, Camden Middle and Medomak Middle Schools. FMI or to make a donation visit www.​knoxadoptabackpack.org, and their mailing address is AIO, PO Box 113, Rockland, ME  04841​. $225 per child per school year is the cost of a backpack.