BEMIDJI-March was a good month for the Bemidji Community Food Shelf.
The local charity organization recently announced total donations it received during the March FoodShare campaign, a program coordinated through the Minnesota FoodShare program. The food drive ran from Feb. 25 through April 7.
"This is the second best we've ever done in our history," said Mary Mitchell, the executive director for the Bemidji Community Food Shelf.
The food shelf received $117,213, and 36,892 pounds of donations during this year's drive. Both numbers were ahead of the 2018 drive, which received $78,744 and 33,000 pounds of donations.
The Bemidji food shelf has been involved in the March FoodShare campaign since 2003. The most donations it ever received during the drive was 56,796 pounds in 2014. The highest number of financial donations it received was $135,472 in 2015.
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Aside from the benefit of having more food to distribute and more funding to operate with, there's another benefit to the successful drive. The Bemidji Community Food Shelf receives a partial match from the Minnesota FoodShare. The size of the match is calculated based on the number of people the food shelf served in the prior year, as well as the amount of donations it receives during the March campaign.
