Gate City Bank has donated over a million reusable shopping bags since 2007, and the bank marked the occasion by giving back to its community.
Gate City Bank President Steve Swiontek says each bag donated takes 700 plastic shopping bags out of circulation. That means with over a million reusable bags donated, over 700 million plastic bags have been kept from entering the environment.
Swiontek says another way to impact the community is to give to local food pantries. He invited Stacy Loegering, Executive Director for the Emergency Food Pantry, to accept a $10,000 gift on behalf of Gate City Bank. Loegering says a $21 donation will feed a family of 4 for a whole week, so this donation will go a long way to feed hungry families in the coming months.
"Any given day, we have about fifty households come in to get food. In a typical month, we have about a thousand up to about twelve hundred households coming in to get food. The majority of the people are you know, settled, working one or two jobs, and it's just those couple of things that may get off within their budget and they're just in need of great food. The last couple weeks we've seen ourselves be low on specific canned good items, and we just put a plea out to the community so - this is just a little overwhelming, to think about what we'll be able to provide to the families."
Loegering says need at the Emergency Food Pantry continues to increase. Last year they gave out 1.5 million pounds of food, and she says demand has doubled over the past 5 years.
