A variety of events this month will be held to help combat the problem of hunger in the Lakes Region, including fundraising walks, a spaghetti dinner with politicians, a stuff-the-truck event, and food packaging at the Maine Mall.

The Sebago Lake Rotary Club has scheduled two related events in late September. At 9 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 21, the club will hold a 1-mile Feet for Food fundraising walk starting at the Windham Middle School parking lot. The money raised by the walk will help buy food for Sept. 27’s second annual End Hunger Food Packaging Event from 9 a.m.-noon at the Maine Mall.

Meanwhile, 12 organizations, primarily based in Bridgton, Casco and Naples, are set to kick off the first Lakes Region Hunger Action Month on Sept. 8, with a free showing of the film, “A Place at the Table,” at the Magic Lantern movie theater in Bridgton.

Other events include a Sept. 15 Empty Bowls spaghetti dinner featuring U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, and a Sept. 26 food-truck stuffing at the Bridgton Hannaford.

According to Steve McFarland, a Rotarian who is co-chairing the Sebago Lake club’s September events, this year’s events are standard fare for the club. The club’s goal is to raise $10,000 in order to package 40,000 meals for distribution primarily at the Lakes Region’s 13 pantries. According to Rotarian Cyndy Bell, the club packaged 8,000 meals at last year’s event. Funds raised at the Feet for Food walk will go toward the purchase of rice-vegetable casserole, beans and rice, and pasta and cheese. At the Maine Mall event, teams of volunteers will package the food in preparation for distribution.

“We’re all swimming in the same direction and trying to make a dent in hunger in the region,” McFarland said.

To the north, the organizations involved in the Lakes Region Hunger Action Month have planned their events in coordination with the national Hunger Action Month campaign, organized by the Feeding America food-bank network. According to event organizer Joanna Moore, the director of Crosswalk Community Action, a Naples faith-based non-profit, the action month events are designed to initiate a big-picture discussion on hunger in the Lakes Region, and how it can be resolved permanently.

“The hope is to get people to start thinking about legislative change,” Moore said.

Moore views local agriculture and well-paid jobs as key ingredients needed to resolve hunger in the area. Food banks, she said, cannot do the job alone.

“They were meant as short-term emergency services, not long-term solutions to hunger,” Moore said.

Dick Enright, a member of the Bridgton Lakes Region Rotary Club who helped organized the hunger action month, characterized the events as the manifestation of a growing social movement in the region.

“Social movements take a number of years before they come to the surface, and this is what’s happening now,” he said. “What we’re realizing now is, instead of ignoring the issue, that as a society, we need now to look at this issue and be proactive in our resolve to find solutions.”

“It’s a complex issue with simple solutions. And the simple solutions are feed the children, give them the best education you can, and then give them a light at the end of the tunnel so that they can start to pull themselves out of poverty,” Enright added.

Moore said that the growing number of formerly middle-class people migrating to food banks has emphasized the need for a local movement against hunger.

“We’re seeing growing numbers of people that are experiencing hunger,” she said. “If you have a growing number of people – even middle class people, that you would not think of as being in need – that are starting to come through your lines because they can’t make ends meet, that means we need to start talking about the reasons of why this is happening. Why are we seeing middle class people in need?”

“At least we’re starting to come together and we’re starting to realize the importance that we need to work on this,” Moore said, “because something has to change.”

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A CLOSER LOOK

For more information on hunger-related events this month in the Lakes Region, see Sebago Lake Rotary Club or Bridgton-Lake Region Rotary Club on Facebook, or Naples-based Crosswalk Community Outreach at 615-3226 or www.crosswalkcommunityoutreach.com.

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