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VIDEO: JaMarcus Russell Foundation Turkey Give-A-Way

MOBILE, Ala. -- The JaMarcus Russell Foundation, with assistance from the Mobile Police Department Explorers, gave away turkeys on Saturday, Nov. 22, 2009, during the foundation's second annual Thanksgiving Turkey Give-A-Way. The event was held at Taylor Recreational Park facility at 1050 Baltimore St. in Mobile. JaMarcus Russell is a Mobile native and former football star at Williamson High School. Following a college football career at LSU, Russell went on to play for the NFL's Oakland Raiders, where he is quarterback.

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Local food bank set to receive donated truck

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

By RHODA A. PICKETT

Staff Reporter

A refrigerated truck left Madison, Wis., on Tuesday morning, headed to Mobile's Bay Area Food Bank. It is a gift from the Walmart Foundation to help the local agency offer more kinds of foods to needy families.

The Walmart Foundation announced the donation of 35 trucks — valued at a total of $3 million — during a news conference Tuesday. The trucks will allow food banks to safely transport deli meats, beef, chicken, dairy products and more.

Margaret McKenna, Walmart Foundation president, said Tuesday that hunger in the U.S. is reaching nearly "epidemic proportions."

"These are our neighbors and people in church with us," McKenna said. "There are those that are in our stores on the night their electronic foods card comes and waiting for it to turn midnight so they can have food on their tables again."

The new truck, expected to arrive later this week, is the second given to the Bay Area Food Bank by Walmart in 14 months, according to David Reaney, the local agency's executive director.

It will run three days a week making pickups from as many as 20 Walmart and Winn-Dixie stores in the Mobile area, Reaney said, boosting donations by about 600,000 pounds.

Reaney said that households all along the coast continue to struggle with job woes. Also, the holidays can be difficult for hungry children because they're out of school and have no free lunches.

"The need is and has been increasing, and we don't expect to see it tapering off until unemployment goes back down," Reaney said.