Step up and Help us Feed Ohio

More than 200,000 Ohioans receive emergency food assistance in any given week. More than a third of them are children.

Lake County families feel the need also. Local pantries received 4,200 requests for food last year.

The need is real, but you can be part of the solution.

Join Mentor Public Library, the Ohio Association of Foodbanks and organizations all around the state and participate in Feed Ohio 2013.

From Aug. 24 to Sept. 11, you can donate nonperishable food items at any MPL branch and they will go to a local food pantries.

The most commonly needed items are peanut butter, canned vegetables and fruits, canned soups, tuna fish, cereal, beef stew and pasta.

Everyone who donates will receive a footprint that they can sign to show they “stepped up.”

The autographed footprints will hang around the library where people can see the accumulated donations and everyone who gave. 

Why footprints? Because every donation makes an imprint.

MPL employees are donating too. They are giving money and food as part of their ongoing Casual for a Cause program.

We'll be keeping the donations in the Magical Step Room in our Main Branch. (That's probably not it's real name, but I like to call it that because it has those enormous steps inside of it. Seriously, they look like the sort of thing Jack might find after climbing a beanstalk.)

The Magical Step Room is directly beneath the stairs up to our children's department and you can see inside of it from our teen section or the public computers. That way, everyone can see as the room fills with donations.

Let's all step up and help Feed Ohio!

I want to fill the Magical Step Room with food for the needy and completely cover the library walls in brightly colored footprints.

Just so you know, this statewide food drive is not tied to library fines. That means, while every donation is needed and appreciated, contributors will not have their fines amnestied.