Because of the support of 448 Texans, Tyson Foods delivered 15 tons of food to the North Texas Food Bank on May 12 as part of their commitment in the Pledge to End Hunger. Serving the food pantries, soup kitchens, and hunger relief agencies in thirteen counties across north Texas, NTFB is making sure this donation of highly desirable protein can help as many families as possible.

“We are grateful for Tyson’s passion to help end hunger. This donation of protein could not have come at a better time as we recently learned that once again Texas leads the nation with the highest rate of food insecure children. Thanks to Tyson we will be able to provide nutritious meals to thousands of families.” Jan Pruitt, North Texas Food Bank President and CEO.

Leading the corporate charge in Texas, Telligent Systems promoted the campaign throughout the state and beyond with the help of their employees, clients, and strategic partners. Lawrence Liu, director of platform strategy, and George Dearing, corporate evangelist, spearhead the company’s efforts to promote the campaign through their blogs and Twitter accounts.

“I strongly believe in this cause, since I have three kids and just can’t imagine them going hungry,” said Liu, “This campaign made it easy for us to rally our communities and for each of us to take meaningful action. It was encouraging to see that so many other people took part.”

Even if you knew about the growing problem of childhood hunger in America, what could one person do to make a significant difference? Fortunately for St. Louis area children, Michele Helsel saw an opportunity and took action.

Ms. Helsel lives in the St. Louis metropolitan area and works for Kimball Office, our media sponsor for the Pledge to End Hunger. Since her parents have volunteered for years at O.A.S.I.S., a food pantry in St. Charles, Michele devoted herself to calling and emailing everyone she knew to sign an online pledge that triggered food donations to food banks.

Because Michele helped get over 500 Missourians to sign the pledge, Tyson Foods delivered 15 tons of protein to the St. Louis Area Foodbank as part of their commitment in the Pledge to End Hunger. That is enough to provide 140,000 servings of protein to families living in eastern Missouri and southwestern Illinois.

The St. Louis Area Foodbank distributes food to over 500 food pantries, soup kitchens and community feeding programs 70,000 people living in 26 counties each and every week.

Representatives from MediaSauce, Kimball Office, Tyson and St. Louis Area Foodbank attended the ceremony.

Local media coverage:
KMOV (CBS): Video
KSDK (NBC): Website story