Students from the Tyler Area Christian Home Educators group package boxes for the Senior Box Program at the East Texas Food Bank Monday Dec. 12, 2016 in Tyler. The Senior Box Program provides a free box of nutritious food to more than 2,000 seniors each month. (Sarah A. Miller/Tyler Morning Telegraph)

Monday is an important day for Mike Simpson, board president of the Noonday Food Pantry. It’s the day each week he and others from his agency come to Tyler to pick up food for those in need in their community.

“We come to Tyler on Mondays to get our food,” Simpson said. “On Wednesday, we will distribute 5,000 pounds of food to the families in Noonday. During the holidays, we see an increase of those in need.”

The Noonday Food Pantry relies on the East Texas Food Bank to assist 11,000 people in 3,500 households with 180,000 pounds of food annually.

The Noonday pantry is only one of the many agencies across the East Texas region that rely on the food bank to provide goods to their communities.

Mondays are the day the food bank distributes to each of these agencies, and it relies on volunteers to help package and prepare the food for distribution.

“We usually have around 60 volunteers during the week and more than 100 on the weekends,” Sharllette Jones, East Texas Food Bank volunteer and production coordinator, said. “We have to inspect every item and clean it before it is packaged.”

Barbara Fisher and a group of friends from The Lighthouse Sunday School Class at Green Acres Baptist Church are among those who serve.

Their job is to break down large quantities of rice, beans and pasta into one-pound bags that are distributed among 200 agencies in 26 counties supported by the Tyler agency. In exchange for their work, the food bank provides up to $150 of food credit to an area food pantry.

Adults are not the only ones who serve, though. Students from the Tyler Area Christian Home Educators Classes have been involved in disaster relief efforts offered through the food bank and other programs that directly impact those in the local area.

“They understand that serving others is important,” class coordinator Margie Oney said. “There’s a value in helping others in a ‘me-centered’ world. This inspires them when they can be a small part of helping so many people in the area.”

The East Texas Food Bank gets food in several ways: private food drive donations; purchasing through co-ops to keep the costs down; and fresh produce from local growers. It then distributes that food to people in need through various programs.

One way is by distributing it to area food pantries like the one in Noonday that then provides the food directly to those in need. Other programs include the Senior Box Program, the Backpack Program and Kids Cafe.

The Senior Box Program provides more than 2,000 seniors with a free box of nutritious food each month in 28 identified communities within the food bank’s service area. The people in these areas may have little or no access to food assistance.

East Texas Food Bank CEO Dennis Cullinane said the last fiscal year, the food bank served more than 31,000 clients through the program.

“They have to qualify for the program and they come once a month to the service location closest to them,” Cullinane said. “Volunteers assist them with the box and put it in their car.”

The Backpack Program is designed for school-aged children to have an unmarked backpack of food sent home with them on the weekends or when school is out for holiday breaks. The backpack is filled with easy-to-open food and drinks that can be prepared without cooking.

The Kids Cafe is a program in which the food bank partners with after-school care programs to provide meals and snacks.

In addition to these programs, the food bank’s mobile food pantries are available in rural areas where grocery stores are limited and many people are without adequate transportation to purchase food.

The Fresh Produce Program provides fresh fruits and vegetables to low-income recipients through area food pantries.

A program, which is available in many locations that is not available at The East Texas Food Bank, is the Hunting for the Hungry Program.

“We would like to get this program started,” Cullinane said. “We have a lot of people who have inquired about the program, but we can’t do it because we haven’t been able to locate a processor to process the animals. It’s a great source of protein that we could add to our program.”

Cullinane said the clients served by the food bank are vulnerable to public health issues.

“Hunger is a symptom of poverty,” he said. “We work to meet the underlying needs by providing nutrition education and mentoring. We are an interactive organization working with food pantries and soup kitchens as well as collaborating with housing agencies to get to those in need.”

The East Texas Food Bank is among 10 agencies slated to benefit from this year’s Shine Your Light Community Campaign, a fundraising effort that’s raised more than $1.3 million for 20 local nonprofits since its 2008 inception.

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SHINE YOUR LIGHT

DONATIONS SO FAR

$61,325 in total donations

$10,325 in community donations

$51,000 in matching funds

2016 MATCHING DONORS

• The Clements Family Foundation

• Tyler Morning Telegraph

• Herb and Melvina Buie

• R.W. Fair Foundation

• Barbara and Billy Bass

• Your Philanthropy

• Anonymous donor

SUPPORTED AGENCIES

Read profile stories about this year’s Shine Your Light recipients in the Tyler Morning Telegraph through Dec. 24.

Thursday, Dec. 15: People Attempting To Help (PATH)

Friday, Dec. 16: Meals on Wheels Ministry

Saturday, Dec. 17: Samaritan Counseling Center of Tyler

Sunday, Dec. 18: The Mentoring Alliance’s Boys & Girls Clubs of East Texas

Monday, Dec. 19: Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA)

Tuesday, Dec. 20: East Texas Food Bank

Alzheimer’s Alliance of Smith County

Bethesda Health Clinic

The Salvation Army

Children’s Advocacy Center of Smith County