Associated Press writers Dan Sewell in Cincinnati and Doug Whiteman in Columbus, Ohio, reported yesterday that free food banks say they are seeing more working people needing assistance. The increased demand is outstripping supplies and forcing many pantries and food banks to cut portions. "I've been doing this for 20 years, and I can't believe how much worse it gets month after month," said Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks.People are working full-time, that's not the problem - they just can't afford to live. One customer, Diana Blasingame has lately found herself having to go to a free food pantry once a month to feed herself and her teenage daughter. "I'm pretty good at making things stretch as far as I can, but food is so high now and I have to have gas in my car to do my job," said Blasingame, 46, who earns $9 an hour as a home health aide. "I work full time, but I don't have health insurance and sometimes there just isn't enough to pay bills and buy food."
"We have food banks in virtually every city in the country, and what we are hearing is that they are all facing severe shortages with demand so high," Ross Fraser, a spokesman for America's Second Harvest — The Nation's Food Bank Network, the nation's largest hunger relief group, said Friday. "One of our food banks in Florida said demand is up 35 percent over this time last year."
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