Second Harvest mobile food pantry at LCCC feeds community for Thanksgiving

ELYRIA — Multiple onlookers agreed: Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio had a well-oiled machine running for its annual Thanksgiving mobile food pantry event at Lorain County Community College on Saturday. Like neon ants, volunteers in brightly-colored safety vests braved sunny-but-cold temperatures in the mid-40s as they lifted boxes of food, 2-gallon plastic milk jugs and 2,000 turkeys into lines of cars that wound around semi trucks in an LCCC parking lot. LCCC security and Elyria police waved car upon car off North Abbe Road onto winding campus roads, where each lined up to wait their turn. Other volunteers waved batons to signal cars with open rear doors and hatchbacks when to stop and when to go. Cold but cheerful, the volunteers — some wearing wacky turkey-shaped hats and back after multiple years working up and down the line — wished community members "Happy Thanksgiving!" or returned the greeting. Many volunteers were back for their third, fourth or fifth years. (A few like local attorney and Second Harvest Food Bank of North Central Ohio board member Chris Rewak said they remembered the somewhat-chaotic first year of the mobile food pantry in the parking lot at Midway Mall in Elyria.) Cars started lining up as early as 6 a.m. Saturday for the event scheduled to start at 10 a.m., Second Harvest spokesperson Emily Faust said. This year, qualifying families pre-registered by phone and online, with registration closing within two days. A waiting list then started, with those on it notified to show up once the original 1,300-family target was hit. Second Harvest officials on Saturday said after initially planning to serve 1,300 families, they added another 700 from the waiting list. That meant 700 more turkeys to buy, neon-clad Second Harvest President and CEO Julie Chase-Morefield said as she stood on the blacktop in between serving lines, a handheld radio clipped to her vest. To the rescue was the Meijer on North Leavitt Road in Lorain, which sold Second Harvest 700 more turkeys at "a reasonable price" in time for Saturday's mobile event she said. The first 1,300 Thanksgiving boxes included a 10-14 pound turkey, potatoes, apples, onions, eggs, pumpkin pie, stuffing, turkey gravy, cranberry sauce, green beans and cornbread mix, according to Second Harvest. The plan was to give away every last item of food. "We don't want to take any food back" to the warehouse on Baumhart Road, Faust said. Saturday's event was the third of four mobile food pantries the organization will do for Thanksgiving in its service area, which includes Lorain, Erie, Huron and Crawford counties. A total of 3,400 meals were to be provided across the four counties with Lorain being the largest of the four distributions, she said. Chase-Morefield said the effects of the nation's longest government shutdown and the loss of at least two weeks of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP benefits — formerly known as food stamps — could still be seen on Saturday. Second Harvest said more families are struggling to make ends meet, and might be one paycheck or one medical bill away from having to decide whether to pay utilities or rent or eat. Just one major bill can take months for a family's finances to recover from. Chase-Morefield said federal employees were among them, with many being furloughed and going unpaid while the federal government shut down for more than 40 days starting Oct. 1. That meant "decisions were made on what got paid for or bought" she said. Chase-Morefield said she kept hearing two messages from those being served by her food bank. One is that people are working, but wages aren't keeping up with expenses. Two is the high cost of food, with costs "significantly increasing" over last year, she said. "That really puts a lot of pressure" on working families, when you add in the cost of winter coats and boots for growing children, heating bills and other utilities, Chase-Morefield said. Chase-Morefield said the effort couldn't have been accomplished without the help of LCCC. "For many throughout our community, holiday season is a time steeped in tradition and within the Lorain County Community College family, the Thanksgiving Mobile Pantry has become a tradition we all hold close to our hearts," LCCC President Marcia Ballinger said in a news release. Ballinger said the college's participation "helps families in our community create or continue their own Thanksgiving traditions." LCCC students with families also benefit from the mobile food pantry and from Second Harvest assistance, Chase-Morefield said. Second Harvest said 1 in 7 people in Lorain County are food insecure. "Food insecurity" happens people don't have enough to eat and don't know where their next meal will come from according to Feeding America, a nationwide network of food banks, food pantries and local meal programs. There were 187,353 household visits either through direct distribution or through Second Harvest partner charities at pantries, hot meal programs and shelters in Lorain County in 2024. One-third, or 33 percent, of the people served were children and 18 percent were seniors according to Second Harvest. Second Harvest also is providing food for our partner charities' Thanksgiving events, including First Lutheran Church, Oberlin Community Services, Goodwill Industries of Lorain County, Feed My Lambs, Beyond the Walls and Pathways Enrichment Center. Faust said more local food pantries and their holiday and daily meal events can be online at FreshTrak.com.For more information about Second Harvest, including how to volunteer or donate food, money and other resources, visit SecondHarvestFoodBank.org. "The need is there" all year, and especially around the holidays, Faust said. Filling in the gaps for neighbors in the community facing hunger, "that's what we're here for," she said. Contact Dave O'Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com