Conduit Ministries and Bemus Point United Methodist Church as well as a host of volunteers teamed up to give away turkey dinners at eight locations around the area on Saturday. Conduit, located at 120 Delaware Ave., started a tradition of giving away Thanksgiving meals in 2016, and gave away 200 turkey dinners. Since the initial inception of the giveaway program, each year, the number of meals the church gives away has continued to grow. In 2023, 1,250 meals were distributed at nine different locations in under one hour by the church.

However, for the lead pastor of Conduit Ministries, Cameron Lienhart, serving the community is not a burden, but a blessing, one that the church is called to do.

“We were very grateful and honored to do this again this year, now our 10th year in a row. Even despite the unfavorable weather, everything went smoothly at all 10 locations, and we are already eager to make plans to make a bigger impact in 2025. All told, we served all 1,500 meals, representing over 7,000 provided for this year. We are very grateful for all the support from the community.”

The churches distributed the meals at Love Elementary School; Bush Elementary School; Fletcher Elementary School; Persell Middle School; Washington Middle School; Jamestown High School; Ellery Town Park; Celoron Park; Gerry Free Methodist Church and The Relief Zone in Frewsburg.

Jackson McKeever, son of Conduit Ministries Director of Operations Jessica McKeever, helps pre-load the more than 1,500 Thanksgiving meals the church distributed on Saturday, making serving a family affair for the McKeevers. Photo by Oksana Miller.

In a Nov. 30, 2023, article by The Post-Journal, Maria Santiago, a native of Ponce, Puerto Rico said, “The cost of everything is so expensive, I wasn’t sure what we were going to do. But praise be to God that ‘His’ churches blessed us, and we won’t be hungry on Thursday.”

Santiago was again in line at Washington Middle School, Saturday, and said, “I’m working two jobs and still can’t make ends meet. I’m so thankful for these churches and God’s people helping me.”

The single mother of three continued, ” I went to the grocery store on Friday and spent $200. I only got four paper bags worth of food -only four bags. I got the bare necessities, clipped coupons, got store brand items not name-brand items. … And still only got four bags.”

However, Santiago’s story, while heartbreaking, appears to be not unique for some who reside in Jamestown proper.

For privacy issues, and wanting only to be identified by her first name, Lacey said, “I get food stamps, I don’t drink, or smoke and I work my tail off, but I’m struggling to make ends meet. The cost of rent for me went up more than $90 a month. For what? Nothing changed, there were no upgrades. …The landlord said he must pay more in taxes, but everything I’ve read is that there were no tax increases -so why am I being pinched?”

From left Conduit Ministries Leadership Team, Luke Miller, associate pastor; Cameron Lienhard, senior pastor; Jessica McKeever, director of operations and Ellen Barton, director of music ministry, Saturday helped supervise the church’s annual Thanksgiving Meal program. Photo by Oksana Miller

According to the United States Department of Agriculture, food insecurities are on the rise nationwide – Jamestown included.

The USDA reported that hunger in the U.S. rose sharply in 2022. The USDA reported that 44.2 million people lived in households that had difficulty getting enough food to feed everyone in 2022, up from 33.8 million people the year prior. Those families include more than 13 million children experiencing food insecurity, a jump of nearly 45% from 2021.

Members of Conduit Ministries, Bemus Point United Methodist Church and other volunteers joined forces to distribute 1,500 Thanksgiving meals across Jamestown. One of the distribution locations was George Washington Middle School, where 175 meals were passed out. P-J photo by Christopher Blakeslee