10 You Can Bank On Cindy Feeding Manatee County And Its Families Is Her Passion WORDS: Lela Rast Hartsaw PICTURES: Whitney Patton Most peopl e feel a pang of hunger and simply walk into the kitchen, stand before the fridge or cupboard, and choose something to eat. For many families, this isn’t the scenario at all. Sometimes parents have to choose between paying bills and feeding their children. Or as one story goes, a mother stood stirring a pot of water on her stove, telling her hungry children dinner would be ready soon... soon... until the children ��nally fell asleep without dinner. This doesn’t have to be the case for anyone, and we are truly fortunate to have in operation The Food Bank of Manatee (a proud member of Feeding America and Feeding Tampa Bay), which helps support over ������ non��pro��t neighborhood food pantries, soup kitchens, and churches. Because so many ��nd it dif��cult to make ends meet, studies show food sources like these don’t just help families in emergencies, but supply necessary staples to many households on a recurrent basis. This is a worldwide problem, researchers say, and we are proud to share with you that there is a team of dedicated individuals and local volunteers at work every day, right here in Manatee County, to see that people get the help they need. LOCAL HEROES Last year the Food Bank of Manatee, which since 1985 has been operated by Meals on Wheels PLUS, was able to provide over 4.6 million pounds of food for our community. That’s a lot of food. The warehouse s h e l ves and vas t refrigerator/freezer space see pallets of food come and go so swiftly that the Cindy Sloan and Maribeth Phillips staff is continually building pallets to be picked up by their partner agencies all day long. The food bank receives everything from USDA canned veggies, to pallets of donated crackers from local grocery stores. The
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