Volunteers adjust to higher traffic at Killeen Food Care Center

KILLEEN, Texas (KWTX) - Even though the government shutdown has ended, Killeen area residents are still needing accessible and healthy food.

The Killeen Food Care Center is staying busy throughout the month.

The Executive Director for the center, Dr. Natasha Clarke, says they have been adjusting to more active-duty military and veterans coming in during and after the government shutdown.

“We saw an increase in our active-duty military personnel, so it’s 11 percent. That’s about an additional 150 active-duty members and then our veterans increased to 38%,” Dr. Clarke said.

Killeen Resident Tina Marrow, who came to pick up food, says the uncertainty of funding from SNAP is stressful, but the money is starting to come in.

“They told us that we weren’t going to get food stamps at all this month, but low and behold I checked my card this morning and there was 100 dollars on them,” Marrow said.

Dr. Clarke says they can keep up, but any donations, either food or money, will help them feed everyone who walks through their doors.

“The nonperishable items; any type of canned goods we’re looking for that, canned vegetables and canned fruit is a high commodity right now, peanut butter, boxed macaroni and cheese and canned meat. If we could get those things, and always monetary donations because with those we can stretch the dollar,” Dr. Clarke said.

The Killeen Food Care Center will be open from Tuesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.

On Fridays, they are also open from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

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