With Thanksgiving fast approaching -- many families are finding it tough to put a holiday meal on the table.
NBC Connecticut viewers stopped by two locations, the Sears in West Hartford and the XFINITY Service Center in North Haven, to drop off frozen turkeys, sides and monetary donations. Our annual Joy of Sharing food drive helps Foodshare and the Connecticut Food Bank provide meals to families in need for the Thanksgiving holiday.
About one in five children in Connecticut go hungry with their parents not knowing where their next meal will come from, according to experts.
“In Connecticut we have over 500,000 people facing food insecurity on a daily basis year round," Sarah Morrocco, of Connecticut Food Bank said.
The Hartford Wolf Pack also helped the cause, collecting more than 3,000 items at recent hockey games.
”It’s a great event, a great cause, so the Wolf Pack wanted to help out,” Adam Goldberg, of the Wolf Pack, said.
One car stopped by with 30 turkeys to contribute and a man wearing a Santa hat and beard rolled in on his motorcycle to donate.
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“The holiday spirit. I gotta start a little early this year cause there’s a lot of people in need out there," the Santa, also known as Rick Mills, of West Hartford, said.
Items collected at the West Hartford Sears were donated to Foodshare, which has a goal to "distribute 19,896 turkeys in the next few days," according to Jordan Nyberg, of Foodshare.
"We’re at about 12,000 or so but that doesn’t mean we can rest now," she said.
Items collected at the North Haven XFINITY Service Center were donated to the Connecticut Food Bank.
“Cash is sometimes the best donation for us. With a dollar we can feed somebody for a day," Morrocco said of the Connecticut Food Bank's work to feed families in need.
NBC Connecticut wants to thank everyone who came out to the food drive Saturday morning.
104.1 WMRQ and the Hartford Wolf Pack co-sponsored the food drive.
