West Omaha’s Hope Presbyterian Church began their harvest season Tuesday afternoon. Their harvest, which will include fruits, vegetables and sweet corn, is part of a community program two members of the congregation began nearly 10 years ago when the church first opened the building.
The church first started selling the sweet corn to people of the congregation and surrounding neighborhood, with proceeds going towards the building fund and local pantries.
But with several missions’ high demand for food, the church decided to donate excess corn to local charities.
Each year, the church’s Missions Committee chooses a new mission that will receive the cob donations.
For several years, the recipient had been the Siena Francis House, Omaha’s largest shelter.
The church donates a few dozen cobs with each harvest, but Tim Sully from Siena Francis House says donated fruits and vegetables are a rare commodity and greatly appreciated.
"That's really the only way it works out for us. We certainly couldn't afford to purchase all of the food to make all of those meals. We presume that it would be another close to a million dollars more in our budget if we had to purchase those foods,” said Sully.
