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Hillsborough Co. kids spend spring break helping families in need with Feeding Tampa Bay

Feeding Tampa Bay warehouse
Posted at 5:36 PM, Mar 15, 2023
and last updated 2023-03-16 08:41:06-04

TAMPA, Fla. — Feeding Tampa Bay’s warehouse is packed with volunteers. A lot of them are Hillsborough County students. Hundreds of them are spending their spring break helping families in need.

“You guys are working hard. Thank you for coming in today,” said Rhonda Gindlesperger to a hand full of kids sorting food.

Gindlesperger is the Chief Operating Office for Feeding Tampa Bay.

“They’re making sure the product that we’re putting on someone else’s table is good and safe to consume.”

Feeding Tampa Bay serves 10 counties, of which one and four children are food insecure. Last year, the organization served 92 million meals. Gindlesperger said the donations and volunteers — the students— made it all possible.

“It’s amazing to hear that the youth really understand that food is needed for our neighbors,” she said, looking back at some of the kids sorting canned goods.

FTB gets several truckloads of donations daily. Employees and volunteers unload them, inspect them, and organize them. Then all of that food is sorted through again, checking to make sure nothing is opened, damaged or out of date.

The kids volunteering this week then put those donations in specific boxes, and they are sorted out to go to more than 400 local charity and food pantry partners, and individuals. The donations are also used at FTB’s mega pantries, which they started during the pandemic.

Gindlesperger said it takes volunteers and employees two to three days to have all the food ready to go out to the public.

“They work really hard to get it to the public in a timely fashion,” she said. “It really is a lot of work, and they do a great job.”

And they can always use more volunteers. If you are interested in volunteering or donating to FTB, click here to learn more.