By Matt Sepic, KWMU
St. Louis – The United Way in St. Louis is trucking in 50,000 boxes of non-perishable food for low-income residents affected by the power outage.
The agency says it plans to spend more than $750,000 to buy the items from a Chicago-based food bank network.
St. Louis Area Food Bank director Frank Finnegan said the idea is to help people who lost frozen and refrigerated items during the outage.
"By the time we start to distribute this on Saturday, almost the entire community will be back up and have electricity," Finnegan said. "So what we're trying to do here is provide them with enough shelf-stable product so that they won't have to spend money to acquire those things and they can go back then and replenish their refrigerators and their freezers."
Finnegan said there was not enough time to plan a major food drive, or to get it from local sources.
The Salvation Army will begin distributing the boxes Saturday.
Those wishing to donate items may do so at any area food bank.
Free meals will be served and handed out in boxes at: (hot meals served at times in parentheses)
St. Louis City
- Wohl Recreation Center, (noon), 1515 N. Kingshighway
- Tandy Recreation Center, (noon), 4106 Kennerly
- Gamble Recreation Center, (noon), 2907 Gamble
- 12th & Park Recreation Center, (noon), 1410 S. Tucker
- Prince Hall Family Support Center, (noon), 4411 N. Newstead
- Salvation Army Temple Corp., (noon), 2740 Arsenal
- Salvation Army Carondelet Corp., (noon), 3601 Weber
- Mount Zion Church, (noon), 1444 S. Compton
St. Louis County
- Florissant (5 p.m.), JFK Center, 315 Howdershell
- University City (5 p.m.), 8136 Groby
- Maplewood (5 p.m.), 7701 Rannells
- Jennings (5 p.m.), 2120 Hord
- Mt. Beulah (5 p.m.), 7823 Racine
- North County Recreation Center (5 p.m.), 2577 Redmon, Spanish Lake
- West Side Baptist (5 p.m.), 2677 Dunn
Illinois
- Granite City Township, 2060 Delmar
- Brown Center, Pontoon & Franklin, Granite City
- Granite City Corps, 3007 E 23rd St., Granite City
- Clyde Jordan Senior Center, (noon), 6755 State Street, East St. Louis
- Lincoln Middle School (noon), 12 S. 10th Street, East St. Louis
- Nelson Mandela School, 1800 N. 25th Street, East St. Louis