Vons Gives $14,000 to Area Food Bank

Vons Markets will present Food Share, Ventura County’s largest food bank, with a $14,000 check at the food organization’s 13th annual Founder’s Day volunteer picnic, to be held from noon to 3 p.m. Sunday.

Food Share provides groceries to about 38,000 low-income county residents each month. The gift from Vons was collected through the store’s “Check Out Hunger” program, in which Vons shoppers could round off their grocery totals to the next higher dollar and donate the difference to hunger-fighting efforts.

The money was raised within Ventura County and is earmarked for community hunger programs, said Sue Murphy, food bank director of development. The need for the food bank is always growing, especially among the working poor, she said.

“The problem of hunger is more prevalent than people might think: One in five children in Ventura County go to bed hungry,” Murphy said.

Food Share relies heavily on individual and corporate donations.

The picnic will be at Zermeno Park, behind a pipe yard near the intersection of Ventura Avenue and Scale Road in Ventura.