RISON – By the time the Arkansas Food Bank officially kicked off its free food distribution last Thursday morning at the Dollar General in Rison, only about four boxes of food remained.
The official starting time for the food giveaway was 10 a.m., but Cleveland County Sheriff’s Deputy Paul Sims said people began lining up in their vehicles for the drive-through distribution at about 9 a.m. Sims, who helped work traffic at the giveaway, said they had a double-file line snaking through the parking lot when they opened the distribution earlier than planned.
Sarah Riffle, chief development officer for the Arkansas Food Bank, said the scene at Rison has become a familiar sight in the wake of job layoffs with the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. “We’re seeing clients we have never seen before,” she said as they wrapped up the Rison distribution last Thursday morning.
Those who arrived after the food had been given away were provided with information about where other food would be available through the Food Bank’s network.
While many local churches and other groups give away food on a regular basis, organizers of last Thursday’s distribution believed this was the first time that a nationally-affiliated food program like the Arkansas Food Bank had a giveaway in Cleveland County. The Arkansas Food Bank is part of the Feeding America, the nation’s largest domestic hunger-relief organization.
In April, Feeding America announced an estimated $1.4 billion in additional resources will be needed over the next six months to provide enough food for those struggling with hunger. That reflects a 30 percent increase to the baseline six-month operating costs of the 200 member food banks nationwide.
According to Feeding American, about 17 percent (about 1,420 people) of the population in Cleveland County was identified as “food insecure” based on 2017 statistics.
To read the full article, see the May 27, 2020 print or eHerald edition.
