ST. CLAIRSVILLE — Belmont County Farm Bureau member Devin Cain is gearing up to host the sixth annual school backpack program’s packing event.

He spoke to the Belmont County Board of Commissioners about the importance of his event on Wednesday morning.

The packing event will see volunteers pack bulk ingredients into cardboard boxes and ship the boxes to every public school in Belmont County. Once the schools receive the boxes, that food will be distributed to the students in need once a week until the end of the school year.

The packing event will take place at Friends Church’s Ickes Family Life Center on Nov. 22 at noon and Nov. 23 at 1 p.m.

“We started with Union Local, Barnesville, St Clairsville and Bellaire. They already had backpack programs, but their backpack programs were like chips, Slim Jims, crackers and just small stuff for the kids to eat in their backpack,” Cain said. “But the problem that I saw was that a lot of the kids ate it on the bus before they got home because their older siblings would take the food from them and then they still wouldn’t have anything to eat on Saturday and Sunday to get them back to school.”

Once Cain saw that trend, he tried to adapt the program to better serve the students.

During the packing event volunteers will take bulk ingredients and scoop the ingredients into individual bags, seal the bags, then put them in cardboard boxes. Each box will have six servings in each package.

“All the kids will have to do is boil water, put the contents of that package into boiling water. Then they have six servings of nutritious meals to eat,” Cain said.

He added that, although it’s called the School Backpack Program, every school does the distribution differently. Some schools place the food in students’ backpacks while some just provide the students with grocery bags of the food.

Cain said that the program is important to him because it’s crucial for kids to get nutrition needed for them to thrive.

“They need a good, nutritious meal to be able to thrive and learn in school as well as excel in sports,” Cain said. “Since they’re not able to help themselves, they depend on their peers and older people to help them along the way.”

Cain said that, when he was growing up, adults helped him and wanted to continue the tradition of helping people who are unable to help themselves. The program has continued to grow each year and has served 618,000 servings to students since its inception.

“When we first started, it was 30 cents a serving. Now we’re up to 37 cents a serving. So it has gone up a whole lot,” Cain said.

Commissioner J.P. Dutton asked Cain if the program is funded through Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, which is federal funding. Cain confirmed that the program is funded through TANF funds.

“That’s something that we will continue to monitor as we move into next year or two in terms of impacts the federal level could have here at the local level,” Dutton said.

He added that he believes that the funding through TANF makes a huge impact locally.

The Department of Job and Family Services receives the TANF funds from the federal government and then is able to distribute the funds available to various organizations and programs like the Belmont County Farm Bureau.

DJFS Director Jeff Felton said that, through TANF funding, a fruitful partnership with his officer and Cain was able to blossom.

Cain has to submit an application for the program to receive the funds which is where DJFS comes in by verifying the application before distributing the funds.

“I appreciate all of the work he’s done. He does most of the work,” Felton said. “We just verify the eligibility, that’s the easy part. Packing backpacks and distributing them, that is really where most of the work happens.”

He added that he will continue to keep a close eye on the federal funds to ensure programs like the School Backpack Program can continue to happen.

“This is an important program for kids and families. It’s one of those investments that we want to be able to continue to make,” Felton said.

Cain added that even if he is unable to secure federal funding in the future he will find a way to keep the program happening in the community.

“​​Even if that money does dry up, I’m not gonna let this program die. I’m gonna apply for some grants. The community funded the first two years of the program, so I know we can continue to go,” Cain said. “It will just be a lot harder, but we’ll keep programming going and appreciate everything you guys do for us.”

He added that he is still accepting volunteers for both days of the packing event and if any resident has any questions they can contact the Farm Bureau at 740-425-3681 or email it at belmont@ofbf.org.