MOUNTAIN LAKES — The Lakeland Hills Family YMCA hosted a meal-packing event to support the efforts of STOP HUNGER NOW. According to this organization’s website, “Stop Hunger Now gets food and life-saving aid to the world’s most vulnerable people, and works to end global hunger in our lifetime. Established in 1998, they have provided over 225 million meals in 74 countries. Based in Raleigh, N.C., they operate throughout the U.S. and through affiliates in developing countries.”
Carol Herring, a member of the Y’s Board of Governors organized this event, which included 62 volunteers and 19 student members of the Y’s teen Leaders Club, supervised by the Y’s Community Service Director, BreAnne Law. The goal was to assemble and package 10,000 meals (each including rice, flour, dehydrated vegetable blend, and vitamins) in two hours for needy people!
The STOP HUNGER NOW truck arrived early containing hundreds of pounds of food, containers, hairnets, gloves, boxes and equipment for the event that the volunteers brought into the gymnasium, which served as the packing center. After some basic instructions from Bruce Ladson, STOP HUNGER NOW coordinator, the volunteers moved to their assembly line stations working in teams as they filled bins and meal bags with food ingredients, weighed and sealed the bags and finally boxed and put them on pallets which were then loaded on the truck.
At the end of two hours, the goal of packaging 10,000 meals was realized. This project was both a fun and educational experience that provided all of the volunteers a greater awareness for global hunger.
Lakeland Hills YMCA is located at 100 Fanny Road, Mountain Lakes.
