It finally happened. The cupboard is nearly bare at the Selma Area Food Bank.

Executive Director Buddy Wiltsie said he had tears in his eyes as the thought about all the efforts of his staff, board, volunteers, agencies who have made the difference in recent months.

Even after the terrific drives in the schools – city, county, private – this past November, the more recent postal worker’s drive, and many other groups and individuals who have donated food and money to the bank, the situation is dire, he said.

Cissy Dohl, resource developer on staff of the food bank, has the numbers to prove it.

“Normally,” she said, “we carry 230,000 pounds of food in inventory. Now we’re down to just under 87,000 pounds.”

“I’ve never seen us this low,” she said, “and I’ve been here since the beginning. In fact, I think we opened in October ’93 with more that what’s here now. It’s just empty out there.”

Wiltsie said that the situation has been developing over several months, but has worsened considerably in the last two months.

“We receive 95 percent of our food from the Montgomery Area Food Bank,” he said. “Beyond that is ‘Second Harvest,’ the national umbrella group that serves the whole national food bank system. Their cupboard is bare,” he said. “Their contribution into the system is almost down to nothing, and we don’t quite know why.”

Wiltsie said that he receives printed reports from Second Harvest, but never oral communications.

Those come through the staff of Montgomery Area Food Bank, he said.

Wiltsie blames general economic conditions both on the diminishing supply and the reports coming back from the 66 agencies served by the Selma Area Food Bank of increasing demand for food. “The demand statewide is up 17 percent this year, and that figure is applicable to the agencies we serve,” he said.

“The big corporate food conglomerates whose names we recognize on the foods we buy,” he said, “are putting less into the food bank system.” Wiltsie believes that food corporations are regulating their inventories ever more carefully to increase the bottom line, resulting in less food to donate than in the past. “The stockholders are interested in the profits,” he said.

Wiltsie said he’s not sure what can be done.

The Montgomery Area Food Bank officials are recommending that agencies receiving food from Selma Area Food Bank increase the amount they return to pay for purchased food.

“In more populous areas such as Birmingham, Montgomery, Auburn and Dothan, there is a lot more fund-raising capability. Those food banks can raise the money they need to go out and buy food at a discount to make up for what had been coming through other channels. We simply don’t have the money,” he said, “nor do our agencies. We all run shoestring operations.”

Wiltsie also thinks the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may be affecting food supply for the poor. “Food that might have gone into the food bank system just may be going into the Middle East,” he said, “to meet the needs of people living in those areas.” That idea was suggested to him by the Montgomery Area Food Bank officials, he said.

Things are so bad, according to Wiltsie, that the supply of turkeys for the needy for Thanksgiving and Christmas, the orders for which are going in now, simply may not be available here unless major funds are raised in the area served by the Selma Area Food Bank.

Under these conditions, Wiltsie is issuing an urgent appeal to individuals and groups that participate in and sponsor food drives to crank them up immediately;

for individuals and groups to consider making tax-deductible

donations to: Selma Area Food Bank, P.O. Box 2513, Selma, AL 36702; or to bring food items, especially canned meat, fish, vegetables, fruit and packaged cereals to the food bank warehouse. The hours are 8 a.m. to

3 p.m. Monday through Thursday. They may also take donated food to those churches and other organizations that participate in food drives, he said.

Questions may be sent by email to foodbnk@bellsouth.netor call (334) 872-4111.

Ironically, there are some staples whose supplies are holding up – non-edible items such as detergent.

Wiltsie said this helps the poor to use scarce money to buy food.

Doh said sadly, “But you can’t eat it.”