The Massachusetts Bankers Association Charitable Foundation awards The Food Bank $5,000

The Food Bank is excited to announce that it has received a $5,000 community grant from the Massachusetts Bankers Association (MBA) Charitable Foundation. The award is one of 45 grants from the foundation, totaling $163,000, supporting social services agencies in Massachusetts aiding in the battles of hunger, homelessness, and opioid/drug addiction.

“We are thrilled to be able to give these gifts,” says Donald P. Gill, chairman of the MBA Charitable Foundation, and president and CEO of Coastal Heritage Bank, Weymouth. “This foundation has done so much good work over the years, yet each gift-giving season we see more need. That’s why each year we dedicate ourselves to this effort to help in any way we can.”

Dan Forte, President and CEO of the Massachusetts Bankers Association, presents the $5,000 grant award to Jacqueline Charron, The Food Bank’s board president and Senior Vice President at PeoplesBank.

The grant will allow The Food Bank to distribute even more healthy food to our 200 member agencies in Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden and Hampshire Counties. We also provide assistance to individuals facing hunger through our direct-to-client feeding programs, including their Mobile Food Bank, and Brown Bag: Food for Elders.

Currently, more than 223,000 people in western Massachusetts are impacted by food insecurity. Nearly 1/3 of those people are children under the age of 18, and approximately 15% are seniors over the age of 65. In the 12 month period from Oct. 1, 2017 – Sept. 30, 2018, The Food Bank distributed 11.6 million pounds of food — the equivalent of approximately 9,676,000 meals.

The MBA represents approximately 150 commercial, savings and co-operative banks and savings and loan associations located in Massachusetts and elsewhere in New England. The Massachusetts Bankers Association Charitable Foundation awards are symbolic of the many individual donations banks make on a regular basis to organizations and causes in their local communities.