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Facing increasing demand for food, Associated Churches of Fort Wayne and Allen County is joining with other religious groups to highlight the area’s charity food programs in upcoming weeks.
The effort, tentatively titled No Child Hungry Allen County, will feature old and new opportunities for the public to support the programs, plus the announcement of a communitywide study of how those programs can cooperate to fill gaps in their services.
“We know there are still families hungry in Allen County, families with children where hunger is an issue,” says the Rev. Roger Reece, executive pastor of Associated Churches, which supplies 28 neighborhood food pantries.
No Child Hungry coincides with the 30th anniversary of Associated Churches’ food program, Reece says.
Despite its long history of service, the program this year is struggling, he says.
The sagging economy has upped demand for the agency’s food by about 15 percent, Reece says.
Food deliveries have increased from once weekly to twice a week, and food is given out faster than it’s being taken in, he says.
Other area food banks face the same pinch, Reece says.
“Though there are reports that the economy is turning in direction, it’s going to take awhile for that to happen, and our food banks are low in stock, and it’s going to take awhile for them to recover,” he says.
Among the upcoming events providing support to food banks is the seventh annual Hunger Walk, which will begin at 9 a.m. Saturday at Lawton Park, and a Christian rock concert Oct. 18 at Memorial Coliseum by the Dove Award and Grammy-winning Australian band Newsboys.
Last year’s walk attracted about 250 participants from about two dozen churches, Reece says.
The event raised $97,000 last year, including matching money from the Lutheran Foundation, which has pledged this year to match up to $40,000, he says.
Besides Associated Churches, proceeds from the 1.5-mile walk benefit the Franciscan Center’s St. Anthony’s food program and St. Peter’s sack lunch program; the Salvation Army’s food pantry and farm wagon ministry; and food distributions at Miss Virginia’s Mission House at 1312 Hanna St.
Several thousand people are expected to attend the Newsboys concert, which is sponsored by Christian music radio station WLAB-FM Star 88.3 and Huntington University, says Richard Cummins, Star’s executive vice president.
Cummins says the concert is a non-ticketed event, which means admission is free. But attendees are being asked to bring a non-perishable food item for donation to Associated Churches, he says.
Also, a $10 donation will be requested for Global Tribe, an overseas missions agency that supports the Newsboys concert tour.
The band is one of the most popular and longest-running in Christian contemporary music.
“They’re huge. They’re the Aerosmith of Christian radio,” Cummins says.
Cummins says the radio station will have drive-though sites for food donation at area Walmarts from Oct. 5 to 9 with on-air support and band-donated giveaways.
Selected drive-through donors will get a chance to meet the band backstage after the concert, Cummins says.
He says the event is the largest cooperation to date between Associated Churches and the station and represents an attempt to reach a young-adult demographic.
“It’s interesting in that you hear young people are bailing on the church by the droves, but they still want to reach out, and this is a way to show they can be a philanthropist,” Cummins says.
Officials will formally announce the No Child Hungry study Oct. 4 during an ecumenical installation service of Reece as executive pastor of Associated Churches.
The service will take place at 2:30 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church, 300 W. Wayne St.
Reece replaces the Rev. Vernon Graham, who retired last year.
The Rev. Richard G. Frazier of Fort Wayne, pastor emeritus of Fort Wayne’s Trinity English Lutheran Church, says study authors hope to look at all community food programs, not just Associated Churches’.
The study will be conducted by Briljent Corp., of Fort Wayne, which plans community meetings to gather information, Frazier says.
Ideas that might emerge include ways to combine the buying power of church-related and other food banks and ways to extend food bank services with ethnic goods for to the area’s Burmese refugee population, Reece says.
“We want to look at all aspects of food, from distribution to how we can better serve families,” Reece says.
“For example, do we need to be open different hours to serve working families?
“We want to look at doing some collaborative work so that food banks and other organizations could all come together to fill gaps.”
