El Paso food bank scrambles to meet challenge as it has only 10-12 days of supplies left

El Paso, Texas -- The clock is ticking for the shelves to be filled at the El Pasoans Fighting Hunger Food Bank. CEO Susan Goodell says they have only about a 10-to-12 day supply of food remaining to give out to the community.

"Every day we face a lot of challenges in sourcing food, (finding) volunteers and manpower to distribute food to feed the community," she told ABC-7.

With growing demand and the pandemic taking a drastic turn in El Paso, Goodell says "the challenge [we] are seeing is whenever we see spikes in the community with the number of Covid cases - that means more people in need."

The challenge is the supply chain is not what it was before Covid, she said, and food banks all over the country are having a hard time filling their shelves to meet the intense demand.

"This food bank is going to continue finding food sources, funding resources because, frankly, we have to," said Goodell.

Their supply is constantly fluctuating, she explained. There was a day earlier this summer when it was as low as 1.5 days.

"We're constantly working to get that number higher. It is always fluctuating. It's the new normal," she said.

As hundreds lined up outside the food bank on this day, the leader of El Paso's only food bank said they provide food for 138,000 people to have 3 meals a day and daily they are getting 125 to 225 calls asking for home delivery for families dealing with Covid infections.

"We have no choice. We have to get this job done," said Goodell.

Earlier this week, El Paso County Commissioners approved giving $250,000 to the food bank, allocated from the federal CARES Act. The timeline for that money to be given out is still uncertain.

If you would like to make a donation to help the El Pasoans Fighting Hunger food bank you can call 915-298-0353 or click here.