Student ‘Potato Run’ helps feed hungry

United Methodist college students in San Antonio peeled out of bed early Feb. 12 to help feed hungry people around the Alamo City.
In less than three hours, volunteers from United Methodist Campus Ministry of San Antonio had unloaded 44,000 pounds of red potatoes and distributed them to more than 40 agencies across the city.
The “Potato Run” was done in conjunction with the Society of St. Andrew. That Virginia-based ecumenical group saves fresh produce that would otherwise go to waste and provides it to the hungry.
The society drove a tractor-trailer filled with potatoes to the downtown campus of the University of Texas at San Antonio. Students from area colleges and other volunteers unloaded 100-pound bags of spuds for distribution to organizations that feed the hungry.
Organizations receiving potatoes included Methodist Mission Home, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, San Antonio Food Bank, Wesley Community Center and Hispanic Religious Partnership for Community Health Inc.
“It was a learning experience, and it felt good to see people happy to receive this abundance of food,” said Robby Balbaugh, a San Antonio College student from Helotes Hills UMC, Helotes.
The Rev. David L. Semrad, United Methodist Campus Ministry director in San Antonio, worked with Fred Fink, Texas regional director for the Society of St. Andrew; Del Ketcham, hunger relief advocate for the General Commission of United Methodist Men in Nashville, Tenn.; and Lorenza Smith, UTSA campus minister, to organize the “Potato Run.”
“This was a marvelous event that hopefully is the seed that will lead to more opportunities to glean for and feed those in need in this area of our state,” Fink said.
The Society of St. Andrew reports that 96 billion pounds of fresh food goes to waste in the United States each year. The society works to salvage a portion of that and give it to the hungry.
“Campus ministry students were doing just that, sharing not only the abundance of food but also sharing of themselves to serve others,” Smith said about the “Potato Run.”
United Methodist Campus Ministry works to help college students see themselves as vital Christian links to others, their university campus, the community and the world and to create ways to make that vision a reality.