Volunteers pack 24,000 meals for the hungry

FAIRFIELD – About 100 volunteers gathered at Word of Life Lutheran Church in Fairfield Sunday, Sept. 29, to pack boxes of food as part of a program called Take Away Hunger.

The volunteers set a goal of packing 24,000 meals in a three-hour span. The meals are destined for disaster locations in the United States and to developing countries such as Guatemala and Haiti, mostly to feed hungry children. Volunteers were divided into multiple assembly lines that scooped the food – rice, black beans, soy with vitamins and spices – into the bags.

Once the bags were filled, they were passed to a person who weighed them to make sure they met specifications, then to a person who sealed the bags, and then to a person who flattened them so they would fit nicely into the boxes. The dry ingredients are mixed with water or a broth such as chicken or beef to make a casserole large enough to feed six people.

Don Henderson is one of the organizers of the event. He said it was the 15th packing sponsored by a group of six area churches. The six churches are Fairfield Friends, First Baptist, First Presbyterian, First Christian (Disciples of Christ), Word of Life, all of Fairfield, and Faith United Methodist in Libertyville.

Each of the six churches collects money for the event. For this most recent packing, the churches were able to raise $6,000 collectively.

Henderson said the program is under the direction of Don and Sandee Fields of Brighton, who started the program to feed people in poor countries who then expanded it to feeding areas of the United States, including Cedar Rapids during its floods a few years ago. Meals also go to Tolsons Community Center and Fellowship Cup, both in Mt. Pleasant, and The Lord's Cupboard in Fairfield.

Beginnings

According to the organization's website, Don and Sandee Fields purchased a warehouse 8 miles south of Brighton in 1999. Three years later, they learned of a missions based program called Kids Against Hunger. After meeting the program's founder in Minnesota, the couple turned their warehouse into the first Kids Against Hunger packaging distribution center in Iowa in March 2003. In their first year of operation, they packaged 250,000 meals. Their desire to help others spread to centers throughout the state and now number 17, of which 13 Don and Sandee oversee and supply.

In 2010, those wing units were responsible for producing 4 million meals which are being used in four nations and also here in the state of Iowa. At the present time they supply Kids Against Hunger food to the Fellowship Cup in Mt. Pleasant, the Crisis Center in Iowa City, and the Southeast Iowa Food Bank in Ottumwa. Through these three outreaches they are supplying 2,500 meals per week locally.

In 2010 Kids Against Hunger moved from their Brighton location to the new office warehouse location at 1301 West Saunders Ave. in Mt Pleasant, where they are continuing to grow and expand. Their goal is to establish 50 wing units in the state of Iowa to help fight global hunger.

In 2016, Don and Sandee rebranded their company under the name Take Away Hunger. Their mission remains the same: 'Feed the hungry and show the love of Jesus.”