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OGDEN — Carrying a handful of canned vegetables, Teague Linford boarded a bus filled with empty barrels.
As she dumped her donation into one of the barrels, the Ogden woman recalled a time when she benefitted from donated food.
"I was one of the kids who used to go hungry a lot," she said.
Linford was among those who donated to the Utah Transit Authority's "Fill the Bus" summer food drive Thursday. UTA partnered with the Utah Food Bank to place buses in locations around Utah where commuters could donate from 6 a.m. to noon.
As incentive for commuters to donate, UTA offered prepaid $5 FAREPAY cards in exchange cans of food.
"(Food banks) have a lot of need this time of year. It’s a slow time for them to get food donations in July," UTA spokesman Remi Barron said.
In 2015, the Utah Food Bank distributed 37.5 million pounds of food, the equivalent of more than 31 million meals, according to the food bank.
Buses were parked Wednesday at the Farmington FrontRunner station and the Murray Central TRAX station, and Thursday at the Ogden Transit Center and Tooele C-A-L Ranch parking lot.
On Friday, buses will be stationed at the Provo Central station and Utah State University's Brigham City campus.
"We’re just trying to gather as much nonperishable food as we can," Barron said.
The food drive was spontaneously planned after seats were removed from buses earlier this year to transport veterans in wheelchairs to the National Veterans Wheelchair Games.
"We thought while we have some of the buses still without the seats in them, it’s a great time to do a 'Fill the Bus' food drive," Barron said.
Betty Kelly, Linford's grandmother, said she learned about the food drive from watching the news.
"We like to help other people," she said. "When I think of people going hungry in our country, it just makes me sad."
Seventy-one percent of food bank clients choose between paying for transportation and food, according to the Utah Food Bank.
Jason Johnson and Betty Schilling brought a few cans to the Ogden donation site. As regular UTA riders, they said they were grateful to get the FAREPAY cards.
"We did have some extra green beans,” Johnson said. "I hate to say it, but we’ve had to dabble in (the food bank) a little bit in tough times. You give back what you can.”
"It does good and you get something good in return," Schilling added.
UTA's FAREPAY cards electronically pay $2.50 bus and train fares. Riders who use the cards get a 40 percent discount on bus, TRAX and S-Line fares, and 20 percent off FrontRunner fares.
UTA product developer Kent Jorgenson said he met a woman early Thursday who walked across town to donate a few cans to the food drive.
"She’s the epitome of this," Jorgenson said. "She probably could have benefited from this food, but she was willing to make the effort to walk and come make the donation. If we can get people that donate like that who probably don’t have a lot of resources, it should tell us that we can all step up." Email: astilson@deseretnews.com
