Muskingum County Food Insecurity is on the Rise

ZANESILLE, OH – The month of September is Hunger Action Month. Food pantries play a critical role in helping community members meet their food needs… in Muskingum County, food banks and pantries are seeing a surge in demand.

The Muskingum County Hunger Network consists of 13 food pantries and four hot meal programs. These services continue to step up, even while facing challenges of their own. Christ’s Table has seen an increase of 3,000 monthly meals being served since May of 2023. By the end of August, they were serving around 9,000 meals.

“We used to see the beginning of the month was a little bit slower for us, and towards the end of the month we’d get busier, but we have not seen a slack in people coming in this week,” Christ’s Table Executive Director Keely Warden said.

The pricey cost of food is forcing many households to turn to food pantries to prolong their wages. Within the month of August, some pantries have seen service numbers go up by over 30%, with working families, senior citizens, and community members of all ages standing outside the pantry doors.

The South Zanesville Food Pantry has served over 5,000 individuals in August alone, and more than 70,000 so far this year.

“There’s been a dramatic increase. Our numbers through August, through the end of August are up 31%. We have seen an amazing number of people come. A lot of senior citizens, a lot of families. There are two reasons; one because there was a reduction in benefits, and the others just inflation. The food prices. People just are struggling to make ends meet,” Dean Holtsclaw, Volunteer Coordination at the South Zanesville Food Pantry said.

For some pantries, keeping the shelves fully stocked has been the biggest challenge, and for others, the donation of time is what they need most.

“East Side has almost tripled our services to the community in the month of August, which was kind of a slower month for us due to the fair going on and back to school, that’s usually a month that we don’t serve a lot in our food pantry. We had over 11,000 meals come out of our food pantry alone in the month of August. It has increased, the need for volunteers has increased,” Eastside Executive Director, Jamie Trout said.

These local food pantries are not federally funded and are completely served by the community. As the lines outside the pantry doors get longer, providers are struggling to keep up with the high demand.

“When things are not always available through Mid-Ohio Food Bank, where we purchase food at a discounted price, we’ve had to buy a lot of food locally. We are so busy, we’ve been having to go grocery shopping a couple times a week to stay up with it. It takes a lot of work and dedication. We’ve had to reconstruct how we do things here at Eastside to keep up with the need,” Trout said.

“I think all of the food pantries and all of the hot meal programs do the best we can to support our stores here in Muskingum County and buy local. We all recognize the fact that money’s coming into us from people pockets and it should go back into our community, so we work really hard to do that. We’re trying to keep our community healthy. If you’ve got a hungry belly, if your child going to bed with a hungry belly, he’s not going to wake up and do well in school,” Warden said.

“Food insecurity is a huge issue in our county. It’s just something I feel called to help with, that’s why I’m here.” Holtsclaw said.

Soup Kitchen, Free Lunch – Christ’s Table – Zanesville, Ohio (christstable.org)

Food Pantry – Zanesville, Ohio – Muskingum County – Eastside (eastsideministry.org)

South Zanesville UMC Food Pantry | Facebook