A cool, sunny morning at the Ellenville Public Library saw people coming out early for the appearance of the Regional Food Bank on May 12.

The event was a distribution of groceries, powered by $5,000 distributed from Assemblyman Brian Maher’s “discretionary fund.” The assemblyman is away serving in the US Navy Reserve, exact location unknown, but thought to be the Indian Ocean.

Maher’s office staff were on hand at Ellenville’s library to help with distributing hundreds of bags of a wide variety of common everyday foods. Two types of bags were up for grabs, cold and shelf-stable. Cold bags contained frozen chicken, ground beef, and cheese, while shelf-stable bags included pasta sauce, canned fruit cocktail, rice, peanut butter, jelly, cereal, shelf-stable milk, juice, fresh pears, and bread.

The other partner in this is the Ramapo Catskill Library System, to which the Ellenville library belongs. Jen Park, a Government Relations Specialist from the RCLS was present, busily moving full bags of groceries onto the presentation pad. She explained that the Ellenville mission was but the first of three.

“There will be two more,” she said, “down in Sullivan County in July.”

Regional Food Bank’s Barry Lewis was also moving bags of groceries, staying at his post as the event began and the line began to move. Lewis gave thanks to Assemblyman Maher, and added that the Food Bank is working with the Ellenville United Methodist Church which hopes to expand its own food pantry.

Emelia Estep, Team and Adult Program Coordinator at the library said that “it seems to be going very well.”

The bags totaled 5,209 pounds of food, and served 200 people.