In an effort to get more food out to the under served counties in our service area, the Kansas Food Bank has been on the road.

June 17th marked our maiden voyage of a mobile pantry to Marion County.  There we helped 224 families and distributed 15,000 pounds of food.

In August we will deploy the mobile pantry to the following counties:  Chautauqua, Elk and Neosho.   On deck for September are counties in the northwest part of our state.

A mobile pantry is simply a pantry on wheels and not confined by bricks and mortar.  We work in advance with community partners to schedule a time and location.  On the day of distribution we load up the truck and head to our destination.  Once there, volunteers help us unload and set up.  We then distribute product in an open farmer’s market style.  Our guests are able to select items they can use.  We take an assortment of canned and dry items, produce, bread and drink.  At the end of our distribution time, we clean up, load up and come home.  It is a quick and easy way to distribute food in a barrier free environment.

We have also been working with agencies in McPherson, Marion and Butler Counties to distribute additional produce.  Agencies have opened up for special “Produce Only” distribution days.  These distributions allow the agencies to help anyone in need of food assistance without going through their normal intake process.  As more and more produce becomes available to us, we will work with other counties to offer the same type of distributions.  It’s just another way we are going to distance to ensure that no Kansan go hungry.