September is Hunger Action Month, but the Tarrant Area Food Bank will get an early start kicking off the hunger awareness campaign with a Back-to-School Mega Mobile Food Distribution event at Herman Clark Memorial Stadium on Friday.
"Food is the most important school supply of all," Tarrant Area Food Bank Chief External Affairs Officer Stephen Raeside said.
The TAFB expects 3,000 families and needs volunteers to help get food where it's needed. One of every four children in the Tarrant Area Food Bank service area is food insecure.
"September is a time every year where we take four weeks and we try to advocate for hungry neighbors," Raeside said. "We call on our supporters to volunteer, to donate, and just generally raise awareness for the hungry families we have in Fort Worth."
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TAFB provides one million meals a week, which hasn't dropped since the pandemic ended.
"At the food bank we have just 125 employees and that number of people cannot distribute a million meals every single week," Raeside said. "So we call on the public to help us out. In a typical year, we have about 25,000 volunteers, and we couldn't move all that food without them."
"To be able to give back to your community, since I grew up in Fort Worth, lived here my entire life, it means a lot," TAFB volunteer Ronnie Wilson said. "And to make other people happy makes me happy."
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Wilson volunteers inside the warehouse and at food distribution events, such as Friday's Back-to-School Mega Mobile Food Distribution at Herman Clark Memorial Stadium.
"I can wake up with a smile on my face, knowing today I get to go help serve people with the Tarrant Area Food Bank," Wilson said. "That just always makes for a good day."
The Back-to-School Mega Mobile Food Distribution is Friday, Aug. 30, from 8 a.m. until 10 a.m.
For information about volunteering with the Tarrant Area Food Bank for that event and beyond, click here.
