Greater Lansing Food Bank sees an increase in those needing their services

You know the holidays are tough for some people and many of them tend to turn to food banks for help. And the Greater Lansing Food Bank is seeing those numbers increase for those who need their services.

"The more food coming into the warehouse means the more food that is coming out," said Kelly Miller is the chief development officer.

Inside of the Greater Lansing food bank distribution center supplies are stacked up for those in need.

"Things like peanut butter, proteins, milk, dairy, fresh produce, canned vegetables, all those really good staple products. We try to make sure we always have here on hand," Miller said.

"This year we are on track to distribute over 12 million pounds of food out of this warehouse which is the most that we've ever distributed," Miller said.

Kelly Miller is the chief development officer at Greater Lansing Food Bank.

She says this time last year they were helping about 13,000 households every month.

And for the past 12 to 18 months she says they've been seeing a continuous increase.

"And right now that's about 35% over where we were at this time last year. We're looking at about 18,000 households every month," Miller said.

And Miller says they expect it to go up in 2024.

"We've seen folks who have never needed the services of the food bank before and they're calling us up letting us know how do we get food you know, i've been taking care of my husband who's facing cancer and I just can't make ends meet anymore," Miller said.

Those calls can extend beyond just the holidays.

"Hunger is year round. But at the holidays, we try to raise food and funds enough to get us through the whole year as much as we can."

You can help by donating things like shelf standing products, fruit, personal items, dog food, or you can just give a monetary donation.

"We can take $10 and with that $10 we can provide about 30 meals so we can really stretch $1 to go very far this time of year," Miller said.

"We are here to make sure that there's always food available," Miller said.