Forest Hills students donate thousands of pounds of food to Lowell pantry

ADA TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) — The WOOD TV8 Football Frenzy Food Drive is going strong as students at Forest Hills Eastern High School donated nearly 2,000 pounds of food.

All is going down the road to Flat River Outreach Ministries in Lowell, where the need for food has grown exponentially in the last few years.

Arianne Hall, the director of development for FROM, said, “In the last year, in 2023, we had double the shopping trips that we had two years ago, in 2021, and over the summer, we’ve seen record numbers of shopping trips, of people coming in and utilizing our food pantry. And the need just keeps increasing.”

That echoes what directors at pantries all over West Michigan are noticing as people deal with higher costs for food and other essentials. They also rely on donations to keep their mission going.

“We say that we are a community nonprofit that was built by the community. It continues to be run by the community. We need our community coming together to donate items all the time, and we rely on donations in order to keep this pantry running,” Hall explained.

Events like the Football Frenzy Tailgate Food Drive help support that cause so as many people as possible can turn to pantries like FROM for support when they need it.

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