Utah Food Bank is eligible to earn a $25,000 grant from the State Farm Neighborhood Assist Program, but we need your help to get it! Local State Farm Insurance Agent Curtis Hansen nominated Utah Food Bank’s Mobile School Pantry program for this crowd-sourced philanthropic program, and it was selected from a group of 2,000 submissions for the final voting process. Now it’s your turn to cast your votes for the winners, and Utah Food Bank is the only eligible Utah-based organization!
Online voting begins August 16, and anyone with a valid email address can vote up to 10 times per day until August 25. To make the voting process even easier, all 10 votes can even be cast at once! Access to Utah Food Bank’s online profile can be found HERE. The 40 organizations earning the highest number of votes by midnight on August 25 will each win the $25,000 grant. “Neighborhood Assist is another example of State Farm successfully turning caring into doing in communities all across the U.S.” said Kellie Clapper, State Farm Assistant Vice President. “The communities themselves play an important role in inspiring people to rally and vote for these important causes.”
Should Utah Food Bank be chosen, this funding will enable them to offer their Mobile School Pantry program at an additional five schools for the entire 2018-2019 school year. The Mobile School Pantry program provides free food, directly at the playground, of selected local schools on a monthly basis for the duration of the school year. This important effort approaches childhood hunger with the understanding that children are only truly protected from the pain and anxiety of hunger when their entire family has enough food to stay healthy, making it an especially effective and holistic approach to childhood hunger. This program impacted over 234,000 people last school year alone, 130,000 of whom were children.