Above and beyond working hard to keep the lights on throughout our service territory, SWEPCO is also dedicated to fighting food insecurity, an issue faced by millions of U.S. households every year.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, combating hunger is a daily concern for just over 10 percent of U.S. households (5 million).

“One in 7 people in Texas are hungry, and 1 in 5 are children,” explained East Texas Food Bank Chief Executive Officer David Emerson, who manages a food bank that covers 26 counties across the Lone Star State.

The East Texas Food Bank was one of four food banks and pantries to share a $100,000 donation on behalf of the American Electric Power Foundation, at the request of SWEPCO. The donation, along with five truckloads of food, came on the heels of the powerful June storm that saw lineworkers restore power to over 250,000 SWEPCO customers. In the days following the outage, many food banks saw a large increase in food insecurity and requests for help in the communities they serve.

Emerson added that his organization was able to meet the need but only because of their strong relationship with the community.

”Our corporate partnership and relationship with SWEPCO is fundamental to what we do. We can’t do it without them,” he said. 

The rising cost of living also continues to negatively impact more and more families. And to help meet the increasing needs, over the last five years SWEPCO and the American Electric Power (AEP) Foundation have contributed more than a million dollars to support basic human needs. That amount also includes nearly five dozen grants totaling $515,000 given to food-related projects.

The Food Bank of Northwest Louisiana (NWLA) also received a portion of the AEP Foundation’s $100,000 gift.

“This donation is tremendous for us. We have the ability to turn every dollar into $10 worth of food,” explained the Food Bank of NWLA Executive Director Martha Marak.

The Food Bank of NWLA is depended on to meet the daily needs of families needing food assistance, but they also have 130 partners, such as soup kitchens and homeless shelters, who received food from them as well.

Within that same footprint, SWEPCO has also donated tens of thousands of dollars directly to a host of northwest Louisiana organizations, many who serve our elderly community members like the Council on Aging in many Louisiana parishes.

A similar thriving relationship continues to grow between SWEPCO and the Northwest Arkansas Food Bank, where it’s not uncommon to see our employees donating their time, collecting and boxing food, to help the Fayetteville-based food bank stock shelves at over 100 pantries and community agencies.

As Emerson points out, the lack of volunteer help from the community would be an additional costly hurdle for them to overcome.

“Last year we had 30,000 volunteer hours. If I had to pay employees for that work, that would cost a million more dollars.”

Across east Texas, SWEPCO, its employees, and its customers continue to graciously give their time and money at a host of nonprofits, including the Mission Marshall Food Pantry, the Salvation Army in Rusk County, and Newgate Mission in Longview.

The Harvest Regional Food Bank in Texarkana also serves a large swath of the SWEPCO service territory and recently received a large donation from the AEP Foundation.

According to Harvest CEO Camille Wrinkle, the AEP Foundation donation came at a critical time.

”Especially here in southwest Arkansas and northeast Texas, we have the highest percentages in the state for hunger. Food insecurity is in every county we serve,” Wrinkle said. 

And that’s yet another reason why SWEPCO supports many of the organizations that are dependent on the Harvest Food Bank for their own outreach efforts.

Over the last few years, SWEPCO has donated money and volunteer hours helping Meals on Wheels, The Winnsboro Food Bank, The Bread of Life Food Bank, David Boone Ministries and with Harvest’s school backpack program.

“We don’t want any child to go home on weekends and go home hungry. The backpack program is critical to those kids,” she said. 

One of the many food pantries serviced by The Harvest Food Bank is Titus County Cares.

”At our facility, we have no funding from the government,” shared Kim Hedges, the executive director for the food pantry in Mount Pleasant, Texas.

“So we depend on churches, businesses and individuals. When we put pen to paper at the beginning of the year, to stock the pantry, we were looking at a hole,” Hedges said. 

A $24,000 financial hole.

Titus County Cares also recently received additional funding from the AEP Foundation, leaving Hedges extremely grateful of her nonprofits ongoing relationship with The Harvest Food Bank, SWEPCO, and the AEP Foundation.  

“Every year, we never know if grants are going to happen. About the time we’re in needs of something, AEP stepped up with a nice size grant for us,” she said.