The Flat Rock Community Center started giving out food in July 2009 to 8 families and as of December, 2011, that number had risen to over 200 families, most with children. We serve anyone with a 911 address in Flat Rock, Bryant, Higdon and Ider that meets the USDA requirements for the poverty level. We provide emergency food to people regardless of their 911 address and refer them to the proper agency in their area. Sherri Lowrey, Food Bank Chair, purchases food at the North Alabama Food Bank in Huntsville, Alabama, and supplements it with other items such as cereal, pasta, crackers and other things that she does not get from the food bank.

 

We give out the food on the 4th Thursday of each month from 3:00 pm - 6:00 pm. We pack the boxes on the Tuesday before. We have lots of heart-warming stories of lives that we have touched. If you read our article in Connected in the December 2009 issue, you saw that a lot of the need in our area is older people who are on a fixed income and sometimes have to choose between buying food and buying their medicine. We also have grandparents, again on a fixed income, raising their grandchildren.  -Wanda Lyda, Chairperson