GREENSBORO, Ga. — Second Harvest was the most recent recipient of a $4000 donation from Rayle Electric Membership Corporation (EMC) Foundation’s Operation Round Up Program. Operation Round Up is a charitable program supporting nonprofit organizations that serve to meet the health, safety, educational or recreational needs of the community that operate in the Rayle EMC service area.

Funding of the program is made possible when members voluntarily “round up” their monthly electric bill to the next whole dollar. Individual members contribute, on average, about 50 cents a month. Rayle EMC receives no financial benefit from the funds contributed to Operation Round Up as all funds are disbursed back into communities serviced by Rayle EMC to support needy and worthwhile causes in the community.

The donation to Second Harvest will help defray the cost of the Feeding America BackPack Program which is an initiative which identifies pre-K and early grade school students who are at risk of having insufficient food for the weekend.

Second Harvest currently provides funding to serve approximately 200 elementary school children from low-income families with weekend backpack meals which include healthy easy-to-prepare food for kid-friendly meals to tide them over until the school week begins again. This way, kids return to school on Monday, ready to learn.

Second Harvest has seen an increase in demand every school year for the past three years, so they anticipate that they will have more students wanting to participate this fall.The cost is $5 per child per weekend which is approximately $200 per student participant for the school year.Expenses for this part of the operation exceed $36,000 annually.Currently, there are more children who could benefit from the program. Second Harvest welcomes additional donations to accomplish this because they would really like to be able to satisfy the demand.

Second Harvest is a signature project of the Rotary Club of Greene and Putnam Counties. If you have any questions or would like to learn more about a food distribution sponsorship or a BackPack sponsorship, email Bill Bonnington (bbonnington@onpower.com).