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Food Supply Concern Grows In WV

Both major food banks in West Virginia are in greater need because of widespread power outages.

Mountaineer Food Bank and Huntington Food Bank have also received fewer donations because of the outages.

"My fear is that we’re going to run out of food and it’s going to be an extra expense on the food bank that our budget can’t support," Mountaineer Food Bank Director Carla Nardella told MetroNews Tuesday.

The Gassaway-based food bank sent several trucks out Monday to help meet the needs in its 48-county region but only two trucks came in with donations.

"We have just moved from normal distribution mode to emergency services mode," she said.

The Huntington Food Bank serves 17-counties in the tri-state region and director of operations Ryan Slater tells MetroNews his food bank faces a similar situation.

"We really don’t have enough food to try and service everybody. It just makes it a lot harder on us to do everybody," Slater said.

Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s office has taken the unprecedented step of setting up a food drop-off point in front of the governor’s mansion for Tuesday evening.

The Rainelle Medical Center in Greenbrier County is one of the places in need.

"We need food, any kind of food," Bessie Frame told MetroNews Tuesday.

There are about 10 residents that are staying there and most are elderly and on oxygen. The center is feeding about 60 community residents three meals a day who are still without power service.

Frame says water is not a big issue in Rainelle but food is.

"It’s just people who come in and get something to eat because they can’t cook at their house," she said.

MetroNews contacted Mountaineer Food Bank which planned to get in touch the medical center.

Meanwhile, Carla Nardella at Mountaineer Food Bank believes the Rainelle situation is just one example of what will be a continuing need during the next few days.

The food bank sent food Tuesday morning to Nicholas County where 3,000 residents in a housing complex hadn’t had anything to eat for approximately 48 hours.





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