Great news! Now that students are back in school four days a week in the Whitehall-Coplay School District, Leah Saliby’s Snack Pack Pals program will be resuming shortly.

Before COVID-19, Saliby and her volunteers had been providing food for 220 of the most food-insecure students in the district. A kid-friendly and nutritious bag of food was provided once a month and weekly when the PSSA exams were being administered. Approximately 54 percent of the student enrollment is on free or reduced-rate breakfast and lunch.

When the schools closed due to the pandemic in March 2020, Whitehall-Coplay Hunger Initiative opened the community outreach program and started feeding children from the summer breakfast program, which included some of the Snack Pack Pals recipients.

As the program progressed, WCHI started feeding the entire household every two weeks. Each child in the household received a bag of food, similar to the Snack Packs. This continued for seven months until the program ended Oct. 22, 2020.

WCHI has been working in conjunction with WCSD, Whitehall Township and Whitehall Area Rotary Club for a couple of years. The Snack Pack Pals program’s accounting and Second Harvest Food Bank account fall under WCHI.

Now that students are back in the school buildings, Saliby and the district wanted to resume Saliby’s program. Unfortunately, non-employees are not allowed in the buildings. WCHI offered to house the program, at least until the end of this school year, at our new pantry.

WCHI has a team of volunteers who are anxious to help pack the bags for Saliby. Students can earn community service hours at the pantry, and the public also can become a WCHI volunteer. To sign up as a volunteer, go to whitehallcoplayhungerinitiative.org/volunteer-portal.html.

For all WCHI-required clearances, go to whitehallcoplayhungerinitiative.org/clearance-forms.html. These clearances are required for all WCHI programs, except for free community meals, which is up to the individual site’s leadership.

Though Saliby obtains some food from Second Harvest, many items she needs are not available. She relies on the public’s generous food and monetary donations to supplement the food from Second Harvest. The Whitehall and Coplay public libraries and my Re/Max office at 1080 Schadt Ave. are drop-off locations for the program. Whitehall Mayor Michael Harakal Jr. will also allow a drop-off box in the township municipal building lobby once it opens again to the public.

Monetary donations are payable to WCHI and can be mailed to 1080 Schadt Ave., Whitehall, 18052. Write Snack Pack Pals in the memo section.

Needed food items include peanut butter to-go packs, small boxes of raisins, Ramen noodle bricks, oatmeal packets, tiny boxes or bowls of cereal, fruit cups, granola bars, peanut butter cheese crackers and macaroni and cheese boxes.

For more information, contact Saliby at salibyl@whitehallcoplay.org.