MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The Mid-South Food Bank moves millions of pounds of food every month.
The only way to make that happen is with the help of volunteers.
FOX13 spoke with a volunteer who said giving back goes beyond helping those in need. Her name is Lois Mason, and she has been a volunteer for the last ten months.
“To give back and help somebody. I really love doing it,” Mason said.
She also told FOX13, “Knowing someone is being helped, you know, this place does a lot.”
More than a million pounds of food could be ready to be boxed up on any given day.
In fact, 60 to 125 people volunteer at the food bank every single week. There are about 100 people who work in the warehouse every single day, but it takes that many people to get the job done.
Mid-South Food Bank Volunteer Services Manager Hayes Leslie told FOX13, “Even with the 90 or so employees, we still cannot push all of this out of the building without the help of our volunteers.”
Six days a week, the food bank has volunteers from the community come in to help. Whether it’s one person or a group, Leslie said volunteers understand how far the food bank reaches.
“In the Mid-South, not just Shelby County, Shelby County alone, every single zip code no matter where you live — Germantown, Collierville, Bartlett, South Memphis, North Memphis — every single zip code we help people in,” Leslie said.
Depending on the number of volunteers, they can box around 250 boxes of food in two hours.
“That’s probably six or seven pallets, and those pallets can be 500, 600, a thousand pounds apiece,” he said.
Almost every donation that comes into the Mid-South Food Bank is turned around to get into the hands of those who need help the most.
Leslie said food insecurity doesn’t have a face. With more than 400,000 people facing hunger every day, it takes volunteers to feed a growing need.
“They help and feed so many families in the Mid-South, and I hope everybody is listening. Please send donations and come out and volunteer,” said Mason.
FOX13′s Family Focus Spring Food Drive wraps up this Saturday.
If you can help, CLICK HERE to donate.
CLICK HERE to log onto the Mid-South Food Bank and learn more about volunteer opportunities.
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