Menu
SEMO Food Bank, EMA partner to fill community needs
SIKESTON — In an emergency situation like no other, the Southeast Missouri Food Bank and Southeast Missouri Emergency Management Association are working together to fill the needs of their communities during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In most disaster responses, it’s more of an isolated event where it’s one county, one city, one community, and this is one where it’s nationwide so we’re all trying to secure the same resources, and so it’s driving up costs,” said Joey Keys, president and CEO of Southeast Missouri Food Bank. “It’s driving up lead times, and that’s what’s making this one so much more unique than any other disaster any of us have ever dealt with.”
Robbie Myers, chair of the Southeast Missouri Emergency Management Association, agreed.
“This disaster is different than ones we’ve dealt with so we’re more about trying to help feed people, which isn’t something emergency management agencies have had to get too involved with,” said Myers, who also serves as the director of Emergency Management Agency for Butler County.
The Association is comprised of all of the county emergency management agency directors in Southeast Missouri. Over the years, the Association has developed a great relationship with the Food Bank, Myers said.
Most of the time, the Association has utilized the Food Bank to provide large amounts of water during emergencies — either because of ice storms or flooding, Myers said.
“Or a smaller rural water district’s water is out, and so all the customers are needing water and the Food Bank stations water at some of the locations to replenish the supply — and we’ve always been grateful,” Myers said.
In recent weeks during the COVID-19 outbreak, the demand for food assistance has increased between 60 and 100 percent across SEMO Food Bank’s service area which includes 16 counties, according to Keys.
“Right now our inventory levels are strong, but we’re hoping to keep these levels up for the next several weeks and possibly months, and we have seen a substantial increase in our mobile food distributions,” Keys said.
The Food Bank held 50 mobile food pantries in the first quarter of the year, and it’s holding over 50 in the month of April alone, Keys said.
“In a typical year we feed about 60,000 individuals per month. We’re anticipating we’re feeding over 100,000 individuals during this pandemic,” Keys said.
For example, in January, the food bank served 316 households at Good Neighbor Pantry in Sikeston; 217 in February; and 680 in March.
“Some communities have not been hit so hard, but some have,” Keys said.
At the food pantry in Charleston, which normally serves 300 households; they served 585 households and 567 households in their last two distributions, Keys said.
A couple weeks ago, the Food Bank held a mobile food distribution in Poplar Bluff, which was set to begin at 10 a.m., according to Keys.
“At 6:30 a.m. the vehicle line was so backed up, the police officers had to help with traffic control,” Keys said. “They had to start early, and all food was distributed by 8:30 that morning. Over 300 boxes of food was distributed to cars.”
This past week the Missouri National Guard began helping with food distributions at local agencies, Keys noted. On Friday, the Guard helped distribute food at the Good Neighbor Pantry in Sikeston.
“The National Guard reached out to all emergency management agency directors to find the missions, and the main consensus was to help the food banks throughout the state get the food out to the communities because they know what they’re doing and how to get it distributed,” Myers said. “It’s great the Missouri National Guard is working with not only the Southeast Missouri Food Bank but all food banks throughout the state.”
For the past four years, the Association and Food Bank have had a mutual memorandum of understanding which allows them to get funding or access to food, Myers said.
“We’re just happy to continue to partner with them simply because they distribute food so well and so efficiently and get it out in our community,” Myers said of the Food Bank. “… We know the need will continue after this is over, and we’ll work with them any way we can.”
Keys agreed.
“The EMA partnership that we have is good because they’ve accessed the state resources like the National Guard or sometimes some federal or state funding or meals, and then we have the distribution that works in place to get the food out to people efficiently, so that’s where the partnership really shines,” Keys said. “They tell us where the need is, and we help get it out.”
During the pandemic, the Food Bank is seeing an impact in a variety of ways, Keys noted.
“We rely on food drives and retail donations, and our retail donations were down 63% in March because the items we used to get, people are purchasing now,” Keys said.
Normally, all food banks are there to help each other or send resources to each other, Keys said. During this situation, they’re all trying to get shelf-to-table meals they can put in a box and get to people through drive-thru distributions, he said.
“We’re hoping as people get back to work, it will slowly open some of the supply chains, and we’ll see less families needing assistance,” Keys said. “So, we think there will be a recovery period even once people return to work.”
In the meantime and while the Food Bank continues to provide to those in need, both Myers and Keys noted this is also an ideal time for those who are able to assist the Food Bank.
“When you talk about feeding this many individuals at a time — to put cost into perspective — we spent nearly $50,000 over two weeks on two truck loads of chicken noodle soup,” Keys said. “So, when you’re at the store and you see it’s $2 a can, it’s hard to put into perspective the mass scale. When this many people need assistance, it really is a large hit on our operating expenses.”
In an effort to increase its donations, the Food Bank has also established a virtual food drive, which can be accessed at the Food Bank’s website. Every $1 donation helps provide four meals to families in need.
“People need to know they can help be part of that solution as well,” Myers said.
To make a donation, visit www.semofoodbank.org and click on the link to donate or to check out the virtual food drive.