Food Bank receives 10 tons of food
<p>The Plains community came out to support the local Food Bank which received aid from a faith-based nonprofit, Convoy of Hope. Thirteen pallets of food were delivered on Saturday.</p>
PLAINS – The food bank received their largest donation ever on Saturday with 13 pallets of food equaling almost 10 tons.
Community members lined the streets in support as the Convoy of Hope truck was unloaded, filling the food bank to the brim with around 18,000 pounds of food.
Convoy of Hope is a faith-based nonprofit that focuses on disaster response, community outreaches and international children’s feeding iniatives.
According to their website, Convoy of Hope has a goal “to provide help and hope to people in need in the United States and around the world.”
“Having the Convoy of Hope here is like having FEMA in Plains. It’s that big of a deal,” said food bank administrator Shannon Allen.
Church on the Move Pastor Jim Sinclair said Convoy of Hope approached him while he was in Missouri for a church gathering and extended their hand of help to him.
“They do disasters all over the world. They did Haiti, Katrina, Sandy,” said Pastor Sinclair.
“And now they’re in Plains, Montana,” added Allen.
Another administrator of the food bank, Deb Warren said she hoped the food would keep them stocked for another couple of months.
The food bank is a supplement food bank and helps anywhere from 300 to 600 individuals a month.
As crews unloaded the goods into the building, chains of people handed down boxes and stacked them, showing teamwork at its finest.
But the work didn’t stop there.
Currently the food bank is only able to hold about six pallets of food. Due to the cramped spaces, the rest of the food was taken to a storage unit to be sorted and divided into categories.
“We were graciously donated a storage unit so we have a month to get all (the food) separated and then we’ll stack it up,” said Warren.
Berry Brown, the driver of the Convoy of Hope truck, left for his journey on Wednesday and traveled two days to deliver the food to Pastor Jim.
Having known him through mission trips in Africa and other church related activities, Brown surprised the Pastor by delivering the goods.
“Two of our rural compassion guys that came here earlier and visited with Pastor Jim saw the need here at the food bank. So they requested for help for Pastor Jim and the community,” said Brown.
To his knowledge, Convoy of Hope had only made one other delivery to Montana.
Although, no one knows if Convoy of Hope will return with more food in the future, people remain hopeful that they will continue to help.
“I hope and pray it’s not a one-time thing but I’m just the driver,” said Brown with a smile.