The Food Bank is preparing to serve thousands of Missouri children during the upcoming school year with the Buddy Pack program.

"The Buddy Pack program provides children with food over the weekends to help supplement what they do not have," said Darren White, with The Food Bank. "It's a bag of food, roughly five items...all kid-friendly foods to help them get through the weekends. It goes throughout the whole school year, so every Friday they get this bag of food to take home to help supplement what they might not have."

The Buddy Pack program is in 28 of The Food Bank's 32 county service area, and serves 7,500 kids on a weekly basis. Nine schools receive Buddy Pack deliveries in Pettis County, and 219 Pettis County children receive assistance through the program.

White says that the Buddy Pack program has enough funds to cover about 90 of the 210 Pettis County clients for the next school year, and that fundraising to support the program is underway. "A Buddy Pack for the whole school year is $180 for one child. Multiply it by 219, it's almost $40,000 that we need to raise to fund these kids."

Central Bank in Pettis County is collecting funds for the Buddy Pack program in Pettis County. "Anyone that wants to give towards the Buddy Pack, they can simply mail their funds to Central Bank, or drop them off at any Central Bank branch in Pettis County and Sedalia," said White.

According to White, families with children that might be candidates for receiving Buddy Packs should inquire about the program through their school. "They can reach out to the school, and the school will reach out to us. The schools are the ones that determine what kids get Buddy Packs, and they let The Food Bank know, and we try to supplement and provide for that number of kids."

To donate to the Buddy Pack program, mail a check payable to "The Food Bank" with "Pettis County Buddy Pack" in the memo line to:

Central Bank of Sedalia

Attn: Cindy Morris

403 West Broadway

Sedalia, Missouri  65302-0351

Online donations are also accepted at ShareFoodBringHope.org.

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