Did you know that Second Harvest Foodbank of the Mahoning Valley fulfills more than 13,000 requests for food assistance each week? Hunger has been and remains a major issue. It’s why 13 years ago, we here at 21 WFMJ started the Feed our Valley campaign.

The campaign is designed to educate people about a reality that so many families struggle with.

In an effort to help, the Arab American Community Center partnered with Second Harvest to start a food distribution.

“One of the things that we’ve learned in our community center is how we can be better neighbors. During every meeting every month, we ask how can we better Youngstown, how can we lend a hand? So it’s very important to do this,” said Ashraf Salman.

When they first started two months ago, about 250 families were served, and 30,000 pounds of food was distributed. This past Saturday, nearly 400 families waited in a line more than a mile long to get meat, produce, dairy, and bread.

“We have people coming at 7 o’clock, two hours before our event starts, so it’s definitely overwhelming,” said Salman.

Among the volunteers passing out food was 12-year-old Salsabeel Al-Karain.

“It’s nice to help people that need a little assistance in the community, and when the job is over, it feels so good to be helping people,” said Al-Karain.

Hester Howell was one of the food recipients. “It’s awesome; it’s awesome. This is like my third month coming up here, and each time you get enough food to last you a long time, and I appreciate these people,” said Howell.

It’s an eye-opening experience to see so many people struggle to meet one of life’s most basic needs – food. For many of them, it’s simply about survival.

“People are not going to come here at five o’clock in the morning and sit in their car in freezing cold if they didn’t need it,” said Mike Iberis, Executive Director for Second Harvest.

The need remains great. One in six adults and one in four children in the Mahoning Valley are food insecure.

“The need in the Mahoning Valley has stayed relatively stable. We have not seen a huge spike, yet we still have over 13,000 people a week that are coming to a soup kitchen or a food pantry in Columbiana, Mahoning, and Trumbull counties,” said Iberis.

Of the food distributed by Second Harvest, 32% goes to children, and 20% go to seniors.

“Senior Citizens and families with children continue to struggle, and it’s an area that we’re addressing,” said Iberis.

For the folks at the Arab American Community Center, this is just one example of neighbors helping neighbors.

“It’s very important for all of us; we are all part of this community. It’s very important for all of us to lend a hand. If we all just do a little bit, we can make the community better,” said Salman.

“It’s heartwarming to see that the Arab-American community has come forward and said look, we know that people are struggling in our community, and we want to help them,” said Iberis.

A small effort to try and put an end to the fight against hunger.

“To say that we’ve helped 400 families is definitely heartwarming,” said Salman.

“All we can do as a society is keep doing what we are doing right now, and that is helping in every way we can in order to alleviate some of that pain and suffering,” said Iberis.