CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Governor Jim Justice announcing that millions are now being put forth to support West Virginia food banks and pantries in combating hunger across the Mountain State.
Justice announced the launch of the Posey Perry Emergency Food Fund this week, a $10 million reserve account set aside to support two of the state’s largest food banks, Mountaineer Food Bank and Facing Hunger Foodbank.
He said these organizations together help provide meals to local food pantries throughout all 55 counties.
“For the food pantries and everything, they I guess will coordinate with the food banks, and so nevertheless we’ll get this money to them and hopefully be able to help a lot, a lot of folks,” Justice said.
Facing Hunger CEO Cyndi Kirkhart told MetroNews that their initiative has been working with the governor’s office and the legislator for well over a year now to secure funding for food access infrastructure. She said Justice brought forth the initial concept of the Posey Perry fund during his State of The State address.
“So, it was our honor to support the governor in the legislative session to secure that $10 million dollars of funding at a time when the funds were really being looked at heavily by the legislature, because we understood the value of that fund,” Kirkhart said.
The pantries associated with both the Mountaineer and Facing Hunger food bank networks are now being strongly encouraged to seek funding by directly contacting these organizations.
Kirkhart said how it will work is by the pantries completing an application and directing it to the food banks that are a part of their network, which will then be sent to the two major food banks who will conduct data entry into the grant portal based on each application’s approval.
She said the applications will be reviewed by the governor’s office, and if approved, funding will be released to the food banks and they will cut the checks to the different pantries.
Kirkhart said the announcement of the emergency funds come just in time for the holiday season– a time when people often experience the greatest need for food pantries to turn to.
“We are glad at this critical time of year, the holidays, that we will be able to provide funds to our partner pantries to have food resources,” she said.
Kirkhart said they are continuing to see about a 24% increase in the need of food resources to help fight food insecurity around the state, even further surpassing pandemic levels. She said this is due to inflation and the cost of everything being so high, adding that West Virginia doesn’t always see the economic upturn that other parts of the country does, so the need for these resources here is always greater.
“We have a lot of folks who are doing their very best, but remain unemployed or under-employed, and in many cases working a couple of jobs to kind of help keep food on the table,” Kirkhart said.
The emergency fund is a tribute to the late Posey Perry, a longtime coal miner who also volunteered at food pantries for a number of years.
Justice said Perry was his mother’s brother and a great man, dedicating his whole life to serving the state, whether working underground in the mines or trying to tackle food insecurity above ground.
“You know, just a man who worked really, really hard in the mines until he retired, and then after he retired he reported down to the food bank in Man, West Virginia almost daily,” Justice said.
Justice said this is the first-round of funding for the program in this year’s budget, which he signed earlier this year.