Hunger Is Not a Disease

Thank You for Bringing HOPE

Thank you for your support throughout the year and for the holidays.

I’m hoping that you can continue to include your “feeding the hungry” activities throughout the coming year!  Your donations translate into hot meals, safe shelter, and a reminder to the hungry and unhoused that there are those out there who care.

Your generosity changes lives.  Food pantries, soup kitchens, and shelters restore people’s lives.

It takes all of us to support those in need.

Do you have a crowded closet?  Winter clothing needs include:

warm coats

foot wear – especially boots

warm gloves and hats

jeans and pants

sweatpants

long underwear

The items most often resquested:  socks

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Thanks for reading this blog post.  Please share it on your preferred social media network.  Forward it to your friends and relatives.

Find more information about hunger and homelessness on “Let’s Live with Thurman Greco” on YOUTUBE.

www.thurmangreco.com

www.hungerisnotadisease.com

THANK YOU FOR CARING!

Do you want to learn more about hunger and homelessness in America?  You can find more info in previous posts on this blog.

 

Top 8 Foods to Give to a Food Drive

 

Actually, there are literally thousands of foods which are good for a food drive.  Choose the foods that make eating easy.

Many food drives and food distribution activities are springing up throughout our country.  Thank Goodness!

People are shopping at food pantries and food distribution centers in greater numbers than ever before.  People who never, ever, even paid attention to food pantries now find themselves in lines.

We have now reached the point where we all have choices:  If we don’t need to shop at a pantry, then we need to give food to a pantry.

So, then, the question:  What are good things to give?

The answer:  any foods which make eating easy.

Breakfast foods include:

cereal, granola, granola bars, protein bars, shelf stable milk, juice.

Lunch foods:

peanut butter, jelly, canned fruit, canned pasta, tuna, mayonnaise, and catsup.

Dinner:

pasta with sauce,  taco kits, canned soups, stews,  canned beans,  macaroni and cheese,  canned tuna, salmon, sardines, chicken.

Staples:

People shopping at a food pantry also need items such as salt, pepper, sugar, seasonings, cooking oil, mayonnaise, mustard, catsup, paper towels, paper napkins, forks, knives, spoons.  Is there an item that you use regularly, maybe that item will be good for a food pantry gift.

Items of Dignity:

soap, shampoo, laundry soap, dishwashing soap, sanitary napkins, toilet paper. toothpaste, tooth brushes.  razors

Infant needs:

diapers, baby soaps, baby lotion, baby foods

Pet needs:

pet food, both dried and canned; cat litter, puddle pads, gently used pet beds, leashes.

Homeless needs:

food that does not need refrigeration, food that can be distributed in single servings

 

Thank you for reading this blog post.  Please refer it to your preferred social media network.

Thurman Greco

What Inspires me in the Fight Against Hunger

Well, actually, it isn’t necessarily what.  It’s more likely who.  The first line of leadership inspiration is the hungry people in the food pantry line.  A food pantry really is all about the people grappling with hunger.

But, where did this whole thing actually begin?  For me, it all started with Robert F. Kennedy.  In 1967, he traveled to Mississippi to see poverty and hunger for what it was.  Being a wealthy man from a wealthy family, he actually had no idea.

Down there he saw  hunger and poverty for what it was, not what he thought it should be.  He saw people, elderly people, adults, children.  He saw people with no jobs, no welfare, no surplus commodities, and no food stamps.

If the history books tell this story  correctly, it was the children who got to him.  He saw the hunger as it was. Seeing children hungry to the point of near starvation,  Robert F. Kennedy came face-to-face with malnutrition.

Robert F. Kennedy was both moved and angry.

There is a book out there  telling the story of their  hunger.  You may or may not ever have heard about this book.  “So Rich, So Poor” was written by Peter Edelman.

In reading about Robert F. Kennedy, I read a paragraph which has meaning for me:

“All of us, from the wealthiest to the young children that I have seen in this country, in this year, bloated by starvation – we all share one precious possession, and that is the name American.

“It is not easy to know what that means.

“But in part to be an American means to have been an outcast and a stranger, to have come to the exiles’ country, and to know that he who denies the outcast and stranger still amongst us, he also denies America.”

Those words resonate with me.  They may  mean nothing to you.  But, whether or not they have meaning for you, they are powerful words and they tell a story I see in the food pantry line.

I thank you for reading this blog post.  I thank you for your interest in fighting hunger.  I know that distributing food in a food pantry is not going to do away with hunger.

But, this I do know:  Distributing food in a food pantry will keep the shoppers in that line from starvation for three days.

This is all I can do.  This has to be enough until a better option comes along.

Thurman Greco

Please refer this post to your preferred social media network.

 

 

10 Things You Can Do For Hungry People Now

DONATE FOOD TO A FOOD PANTRY
When you purchase groceries, buy a few extra jars or cans of food and take them to your neighborhood food pantry.
Peanut butter is my favorite choice. It’s shelf stable so needs no refrigeration. That makes it good for homeless people. It doesn’t spoil quickly so it can be used by a household with one or ten people. It doesn’t require a lot of chewing so it’s good for a person with no teeth. In short, peanut butter is a perfect food choice for a food pantry.
However, if you would rather choose another item, go with whatever you want to give. Whatever you choose, it will be selected by someone shopping in the pantry.

CLEAN OUT YOUR KITCHEN CABINETS
Give the unused items to your local food pantry.

HOST A FOOD DRIVE
Invite your friends and neighbors to help you collect food for your local food pantry.

DONATE CLEAN EGG CARTONS AND REUSABLE SHOPPING BAGS TO YOUR FOOD PANTRY.
Food pantries are always in need of shopping bags and egg cartons. Eggs coming to a food pantry usually come in cases – without the cartons.
Shopping bags are not usually found on food pantry shopping lists.

CLEAN OUT THAT CLOSET!
Take your gently used clothing and bedding to a pantry or soup kitchen for distribution. I recently learned that the clothing item most needed in shelters is socks.
I also learned that women’s shelters are always in need of bras.
In the Albany, New York, area, you can send gently used or new women’s bras to:
YWCA – Greater Capitol Region
Brava
21 First Street
Troy, New York 12180

CELEBRATE YOUR BIRTHDAY.
Invite people to a party and ask them to give donations to a food pantry instead of a gift.

GIVE A LITTLE THROUGHOUT THE YEAR.
Make a regular donation to a food pantry. This translates to sending a check or gas card every month or quarter.

CONTACT ELECTED OFFICIALS AND PERSONS OF INFLUENCE.
Motivate them to make ending hunger and homelessness a priority. Encourage them to support fair wages and benefits for workers.

READ A BOOK.
“Take This Bread” by Sara Miles, “Under the Overpass” by Mike Yankoski, “I am Your Neighbor” by David R. Brown and Roger Wright, and “I Don’t Hang Out in Churches Anymore” by Thurman Greco are four books which tell revealing stories about hungry people in America.

START A SCHOOL BACKPACK PROGRAM.
Backpack programs send food home on Friday afternoons to households where children would not otherwise eat over the weekend without the donated foods.

Thanks for reading this article! Please refer it to your preferred social media network.

Thurman Greco

Woodstock

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Help the Homeless

The world of people who are homeless may seem very foreign – But, it’s actually very near.  We meet people every day who are just like us, only they don’t have a roof over their heads.

We can all find ourselves without a roof when we lose a job.  Or, maybe a spouse  dies.  Possibly an accident which leaves physical disabilities is the cause.  In short, all it takes is a personal tragedy.

 

There are many things we can do to help end homelessness.  There are many, many things we can do to help those who are struggling with homelessness.

One easy way we can help is to take a little extra food along when we go out of our home to work or on errands.  A few extra sandwiches will help.  When a person asks for change, offer him or her a sandwich.

A couple of times each year, gather the clothes you are no longer going to wear and donate them to shelters and pantries providing services to help those who are homeless.

While you gather clothes for the homeless, look at your family’s toys, books, and  games and select those that are no longer being used.  Children living in shelters have few possessions and will enjoy them.

Can you spare an hour or two?  Tutors can make all the difference.  Volunteer to tutor children in shelters.

Celebrate your birthday or anniversary and ask the people you invite to bring items for the homeless.

Carry fast food certificates with you when you are going out.  Hand them out to people who are homeless.

Hold a food drive and take the food to a shelter or a pantry in your area.

Donate your collectable recyclable cans and bottles to people who are homeless.  Donate a bag of groceries to a soup kitchen, shelter, or food pantry.

Volunteer at a food pantry or shelter.

Volunteer your professional services.  Lawyers, doctors, psychiatrists, counselors, and dentists can all use your skills when you volunteer at a pantry or shelter.

Ask your company, church, school to host a fund-raising event for a pantry or homeless shelter.  Items of dignity are really needed by the homeless.

Thank you for reading this article!

Please refer this article to your favorite social media network.

Thurman Greco

PS:  The hunger book is really moving along.  Things just never get finished as quickly as we all wish.  Writing a book requires years and years of research and writing.  In writing the hunger book, I have gone through thousands and thousands of sheets of paper and three computers.  I have spent years and years getting this story moved  from an event in my life to a book which will attract you or not in less than two  minutes.

Whew!

7 Ways We Use Food Pantries

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Food Pantries feed the hungry…and very successfully at that, actually.  After all, there are very few stories right now about starving people dying in the streets. We Food Pantry volunteers can  pat ourselves on the back for that, at least.

But, so much more happens in a Food Pantry beyond feeding the hungry.

For starters, thousands of volunteers are kept gainfully occupied and off the streets as we (wo)man the pantries.

The United States Department of Agriculture disposes of thousands and thousands of pounds of surplus foods every year in Food Pantries.  Unfortunately, though, the USDA seems to have a somewhat embarrassed attitude about the distribution of agricultural surpluses.  Anybody who thinks about it quickly realizes that it’s impossible to grow just exactly what we need every year.  It’s much better to have too much than too little.  So, the USDA needs the Food Pantries to dispose of this surplus.  Sure beats hauling it off to the landfill.

Thank you USDA!  I just wish you felt better about the job you do.

Supermarkets use Food Pantries to dispose of food they can’t sell.  By donating produce,
baked goods,
meats,
packaged shelf staples,  
grocers  avoid dump fees, discourage dumpster divers, accrue tax savings, and tell the world about how many thousands of dollars they donated to feed the hungry.

Churches throughout this country feed the hungry in Food Pantries located in their basements. That is, all except for the famous St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church in San Francisco where Sara Miles put the pantry on the altar. She subsequently wrote a book about it entitled “Take This Bread”. I hope you get a chance to read it.
Congregations label their Food Pantries as outreach but I don’t buy into that concept. What we’re all doing, really, is celebrating the enormous abundance existing in this country…in this world…on this planet.

Environmentalists use Food Pantries to divert food bound for the landfill.  It’s amazing when you think about it.  Several million people in our country are prevented from starving to death when they shop at a Food Pantry and take home produce, dairy products, meats, baked goods, shelf staples that would otherwise have ended up at the landfill.

Schools throughout our fair nation distribute food to children to take home on the weekend. The Backpack Programs offer food to children who have none in their households.

It’s a real ego trip for whole segments of our society.  Everyone feels all warm and fuzzy about food donated to Food Banks.  This includes  farmers, grocers, food manufacturers, restaurants, bakers, religious and civic institutions feeding the hungry, and, of course, the people who read the stories about the generosity of these businesses.

This warm and fuzzy feeling we all get when we realize which businesses are contributing to feeding the hungry rubs off positively on Food Banks.  They, thankfully, are very influential charities as a result.  Food Banks rank right up there with hospitals, the United Way, and the Y.

And, it’s all good.  Food Banks need the $$$ to keep the whole industry going.  The demand for the food keeps growing and growing because the  minimum wage jobs don’t pay enough $$$ to allow workers to buy groceries.  SNAP benefits get whittled away each year.  There’s not much left except the Food Pantry.

Thank you for reading this blog/book.

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http://teamnutrition.usda.gov
www.feedingamerica.org/officialsite
www.reservoirfoodpantry.org

Thurman Greco