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Newsroom February's Charity of the Month: Food Bank of the Southern Tier
In frigid winter temperatures thousands of families throughout the United States, have to sacrifice their need for food in order to keep their homes warm. With rising energy prices and limited income, parents are forced to make the heart-wrenching decision to pay for heat instead of buying food. As a result, millions of children often face days where hunger becomes a daily reality.
In the a six-county area of New York state, the Food Bank of the Southern Tier (FBST)—an MDRT Foundation funded program—is working to alleviate hunger by providing healthy meals to families in need. This year the MDRT Foundation awarded FBST a $5,000 grant to provide thousands of nutritious meals for people in need. This grant was sponsored by William A. Tyron, a 36-year MDRT member and Bronze Knight from Elmira, New York. “FBST provides a critical community service to this large, rural area of upstate New York,” said Tyron. “[This area] has been hit hard by job loss and a rapidly rising cost of living.” FBST is a centralized food distribution center that works in partnership with a network of 205 hunger-relief agencies to provide meals for people in need throughout the Southern Tier area of New York. This grant will be used to address the problem of childhood hunger throughout this six-county region where the poverty rate is 12.8 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
In addition to the distribution of food, FBST also provides door-to-door delivery, nutrition education and training, and youth-focused educational after-school and summer programs. Proper nutrition is vital to the mental and physical development of children. This grant will provide nutritious meals for children at-risk of hunger, ensuring that they have food to eat during times when they do not have access to school breakfast and lunch programs.
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