Employees at Fort Martin Power Station in Maidsville, W.Va., restocked the pantry at the Raymond Wolfe Center in Kingwood last month with about 2,000 pounds of food. The large donation arrived just in time to help Preston County families with children who are home for summer break.

According to the W.Va. Department of Education, children in 50 of the state’s 55 counties have access to free meals at school when classes are in session. However, some families are food insecure and cannot provide regular meals for their kids. Fort Martin employees are helping to bridge the gap by putting food on the table for these deserving families.

“To think a child may go hungry simply because they are not in school is heartbreaking,” said Kameron Miller-Hickey, engineer, and a food drive volunteer. “We recognize that families in our local community struggle with hunger, especially during the summer months, and we want to be part of the solution.”

The effort to collect food items began back in the spring as part of FirstEnergy’s annual Harvest for Hunger campaign. Fort Martin employees called their event “Cram the Van” because they filled a truck with food items throughout the campaign.

At the end of the event, they weighed the donated food, and the plant’s managers and superintendents matched the donations, fulfilling a pledge they made to employees before the food drive began. When the final amounts were tallied, enough food had been collected to feed 27 local families.