St. Mary's Food Bank in dire need of donations

PHOENIX (KSAZ) - The heat is on, but donations are down and one valley food bank says this is the time of the year when they need help the most.

Employees at St. Mary's Food Bank are hard at work pulling food off the shelves, but the problem is, they're not restocking them.

"As you can see, our shelves are really low," Jerry Brown said. "We're distributing more food, more food now than any time of year."

Brown, a spokesman for the food bank, says the reason is two-fold. There are more mouths to feed, kids are out of school for the summer and many of those who donate are out of town.

"We're distributing more than 80 to 100 meals a day just to kids alone," he said.

In addition, St. Mary's continues to distribute 40,000 boxes of food to families each month. Right now, there's a huge need for canned fruits, vegetables and cereal, but any donations will make a difference.

"We do 60 million pounds a year, but the bulk of it comes June, July, August, September," he said. "That's the time where folks need the food, so we are there to distribute, but it's been a long time since we've got a lot of food into the warehouse from distributions."

You can donate directly to St. Mary's by dropping off food at the food bank, or donate online by click here.

There's also several drop-off locations throughout the valley.