NORWICH – In what’s become an annual pre Thanksgiving tradition for the Human Services Organization (HSO) at the SUNY Morrisville Norwich campus, students in HSO took to the streets of Norwich last week for a city-wide food drive to help stock shelves of the Chenango County Roots and Wings food pantry.
Using plastic bags donated by the Sherburne Big M and New York Pizzeria in New Berlin, students of HSO collected a total 1,235 pounds of food from city residents for Roots and Wings, an emergency services and self-sufficiency program that provides clothing, food and household goods to individuals and families in need. On Nov. 8, students hung more than 1,000 bags from the front doors of residences throughout the city, attached with a note bidding non-perishable foods and other necessities to help those who need help most. On Nov. 10, HSO hit the streets once again, this time to collect full bags setting at the threshold of peoples’ homes.
“This is one of the largest donations Roots and Wings gets each year,” said Fred Weaver, HSO advisor and professor of humanities and social science at SUNY Morrisville. Given the recent $5 billion in federal funding cuts to food assistance programs, initiatives like those spearheaded by HSO are a community crutch to lean on, he added. “With all the cuts to food stamps this year, this (food drive) will become increasingly important,” he said.
Roots and Wings is among several food pantries and soup kitchens in Chenango County that has been denied funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Emergency Food and Shelter Program (EFSP) for the second consecutive year. According to statements from FEMA, the county is no longer eligible for critical EFSP funding due to a declining trend of unemployment and an overall poverty rate that is lower than the EFSP poverty threshold.
Even so, the need now is greater than ever, say Roots and Wings administrators. The agency distributed enough food to feed 2,000 people across 590 different households in October alone.
“Our numbers have really gone up in the last year,” said Roots and Wings Director Melinda Mandeville, citing record-breaking numbers tallied by the agency earlier this year. Food donated on the brink of the holiday season is often used to assemble food baskets for underprivileged families, she explained. “They (HSO) do an awesome food drive every year and its a good time of year to do it ... If it wasn’t for the community and all these different food drives, we would struggle tremendously.”
“This food is going to help feed a lot of people,” said Ashley Townsend, a SUNY Morrisville sophomore and secretary for HSO.
Townsend also recalled a recent philanthropic expedition of HSO students to Camden, New Jersey, the most poverty-stricken city in the nation. There, they donated time and efforts to various shelters and food pantries. But such efforts should start in the community, she added. “It’s nice to help our county here, so we can make a difference where we live,” she said.
While the HSO food drive has been an enormous success, hopes are to expand on it next year, Weaver remarked. “For the first time this year, we had a community member join us,” he added. “In the future, we might reach out to the spiritual community as well so students can also have the experience of working more with the community.”