2018 Hunger Free Kentucky Day

The Kentucky Association of Food Banks organizes the annual Hunger Free KY Day, a yearly summit to bring policymakers, activists, and citizens together to discuss the state of food access in Kentucky. Held in Frankfort, KY, the Hunger Free KY Day attracted 150 hunger advocates!

Regional food banks, including Dare to Care food bank (Louisville, KY), met with legislators to share the opportunities and challenges to food access that they have witnessed through serving Kentucky’s communities. Legislators’ schedules and waiting areas were filled with food bank representatives throughout the day.

In the afternoon, participants gathered in the State Capitol rotunda for the 2018 Rally to Solve Hunger. Attendees, many of them clad in orange (the official color of hunger relief advocacy), heard bipartisan speeches and resolutions on hunger in Kentucky.

Photo courtesy of Johnna Worley photography; link: https://johnnaworleyphotography.smugmug.com/Events/Food-Bank-Day-2018/n-3DrvWP/

Speakers at the rally included Kentucky’s governor and first lady, the secretary of state, the agriculture commissioner, the executive director for St. Matthews Area Ministries (St. MAM) and even a client-turned-employee of St. MAM. Attorney General Andy Beshear said, “far too often hunger goes unrecognized. Not because Kentuckians are callous, they’re not. But because they simply don’t know and don’t recognize it.”

The Kentucky Association of Food Banks adjourned the rally with an invitation to all Kentuckians to participate in ending hunger by donating a portion of their tax refund to the Farms to Food Banks trust fund. The Farms to Food Banks trust fund awards grants to nonprofit organizations to enable them to purchase surplus agricultural commodities for distribution in the community. For more on the Farms to Food Banks program, please visit: https://kafb.org/farmstofoodbanks/

For more stories from the 2018 Hunger Innovation Fellowship, please visit our website.