Second Harvest Food Bank is our local food bank and its mission is to “obtain food and distribute it to people in need through area nonprofits and to provide resources for education and advocacy to end hunger.” It serves 200 agencies in a six-county area, including Lehigh, Northampton, Carbon, Monroe, Pike and Wayne counties.

As I have mentioned in numerous articles, WCHI would never be able to feed as many of our pantry guests as we do without our Second Harvest membership and its continued support.

Second Harvest receives federal food from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, state food from the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture, grocery food store stock when products reach their best-buy dates and need be taken off the shelves and both local food chain warehouses and local farmers that have overstock.

Bill Meltzer and Jenn Dietz do WCHI’s weekly online food ordering with Second Harvest. There are usually three to five pages of inventory with anywhere from 45-75 total items available. During COVID-19, WCHI had more than 200 items to choose from.

It takes time for Bill and Jenn to evaluate what food is needed and how much of each item to order. Bill and Jenn also need to watch the poundage, since our truck has a carrying weight limit. Tom Noctor picks up all food orders from Second Harvest weekly.

For the month of May, WCHI ordered 17,748.39 pounds of food with a value of $21,028.80 from Second Harvest. Some of the food was donated to Second Harvest, thus the term value, and not cost. WCHI receives a monthly statement for our food orders, which varies based on what we order and where the food came from. May’s food invoice from Second Harvest was $559.78.

Next, you will see WCHI May food items ordered from Second Harvest. I have listed the food category and the corresponding poundage and value: baby food/formula: 6 pounds, $11.82; beverages, such as coffee: 601 pounds, $1,183.97; condiments, including spices and sauces: 834.8 pounds, $1,071.00; milk: 1,368 pounds, $570.24; dressings: 60 pounds, $118.20; fresh produce: 4,592 pounds, $3,906.24; fruit, canned or frozen: 2,552.50 pounds, $3,378.48; juice: 1,172.00 pounds, $1,259.72; complete meals/entrees, usually frozen: 1,081.97 pounds, $1,516.47; frozen meats/fish/poultry: 1,077.12 pounds, $2,862.55; pasta: 200 pounds, $98.50; non-meat proteins, such as canned beans, peanut butter, eggs: 2,385 pounds, $3,125.70; rice: 60 pounds, $117.90; snack foods/cookies: 423 pounds, $833.31; and vegetables, canned or frozen: 1,335.00 pounds, $974.70.

Our WCHI volunteers unload all this poundage weekly by hand and puts them on specified pallets in our pantry, which are marked USDA, state or donated. On other days, our wonderful volunteers stock our pantry shelves for our guests to select the foods they will eat.

Each food type section states how many items a guest can take based on their household size during our pantry distributions. Guests can only attend once monthly.

WCHI also spends a minimum of $5,000 monthly buying needed food items from local stores.

We are most appreciative for the public’s food donations, food drives and monetary donations. It takes many people working together to help WCHI feed so many food-insecure residents living in Whitehall-Coplay School District. WCHI and our guests thank everyone who works diligently to alleviate hunger in Whitehall and Coplay.

Thank you to all our wonderful volunteers for all the time given to WCHI and to our guests. WCHI truly appreciates you all!

Have a great week!