PREBLE COUNTY — Many food insecure families face the difficult decision of buying either meat or other less nutritional and less expensive foods. With this in mind, the Preble County Branch of the United Way of the Greater Dayton Area purchased two junior fair livestock projects this summer and donated the meat to a local food bank.

After partnering with Winner’s Meat Farm on the project, the United Way and Winner’s came together again to distribute just over 1,000 pounds of pork and beef to local foodbanks just in time for the holiday.

Food pantries are “always really low on protein, because that is the most expensive piece,” says Alexa Joyce, Preble County United Way Director, “And it’s not what people usually think about donating. Community donations tend to be canned goods.”

“Winner’s Meat Farm likes to do anything we can to support our community,” said Rob Winner of Winner’s Meat Farm.

“Rob at Winner’s was gracious and so helpful in making the first project happen. For this most recent one, we had the funds to cover about 922 pounds of meat and Rob rounded it up to an even 1,000 pounds” says Alexa Joyce, Preble County United Way Director. “The need for meat in our local foodbanks was echoed time and time again as I spoke to foodbank volunteers.”

In Preble County, 5,110 people struggle with food insecurity (12.3 percent) with 1,940 of them being children according to The Foodbank. This project is just one way United Way of the Greater Dayton Area is working to close the gap for food insecure families in our community.