When the school year ends, the cheering you hear from kids isn't matched in every household. For thousands of South Jersey families, summer means the loss of the free and reduced-price breakfasts and lunches that school provides — meals that quietly hold a tight family budget together nine months of the year. The gap doesn't disappear in June. It widens. And that's the stretch when the Food Bank of South Jersey works hardest.
Based in Pennsauken, the Food Bank serves the four counties that make up so much of the Gazette's readership — Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Salem — through a network of more than 300 partner agencies: the neighborhood pantries, soup kitchens, shelters and community programs that put food directly into the hands of people who need it. As a member of the national Feeding America network, the organization is the backbone connecting donated and purchased food to the front-line groups doing the daily work in our towns.
Summer puts unusual pressure on that system. The school meal programs pause just as families face the added cost of keeping kids fed and occupied at home all day. Layer on the grocery prices South Jersey shoppers have been wrestling with — and a tough season for local farms that has rippled into produce costs — and you have more neighbors than usual leaning on the pantry down the street. The Food Bank's job is to make sure that pantry has something on its shelves.
What's worth remembering is that hunger here doesn't usually look like the images people picture. It looks like a working parent stretching the last few days before payday, a senior choosing between a prescription and a full cart, a family that hit one bad month. The Food Bank of South Jersey exists for exactly those moments — not as charity from a distance, but as neighbors helping neighbors through a system built right here in our backyard.
For readers who want to help, the need is highest in the summer months and the ways to pitch in are straightforward: a financial gift typically stretches much further than groceries because of the Food Bank's bulk buying power, non-perishable food drives are always welcome, and volunteers are needed to sort and pack at the Pennsauken facility. Information on giving and volunteering is available at foodbanksj.org.
It's the kind of organization that does its work without much noise, four counties wide, all year long — and never more than when school lets out.
How to Help: Donate, organize a food drive, or sign up to volunteer at foodbanksj.org. The Food Bank of South Jersey is headquartered in Pennsauken; contact the organization directly to confirm current volunteer hours and most-needed items.
Want to Help the Food Bank of South Jersey?
Donate, organize a food drive, or volunteer at foodbanksj.org. Summer is when the need is highest.
Visit foodbanksj.org →