The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County, which operates its poverty-fighting program all year long, observed a special occasion on Tuesday - National Hunger Awareness Day.

The warehouse operation at 4554 Hollister Ave. was humming, cars coming and going, volunteers loading food and household supplies for distribution. “We have a nice array of community volunteers,” observed Tiffani Hill, program manager for the agency.

Goleta Mayor Jean Blois was there, in comfortable sports clothes, ready to pitch in. Santa Barbara Mayor Marty Blum was helping out. Television news personalities added a touch of glamour, and the regulars - people who serve every week, all during the year - were also on hand.

One woman, Lois Mitchell of Montecito, was there with her two daughters, Bridget, seven-and-a-half, and Nathalie, 11. “I asked to take them out of school today, because I thought it would be a good experience for them,” Mitchell said. She works for the Orfalea Foundation, created by Kinko’s founder Paul Orfalea to distribute funds for a variety of relief and educational causes.

The nationwide awareness project was designed to enhance public understanding of the problem that never goes away, hunger. Along with local food banks, religious institutions and community centers took part in the observance, just as they also provide food allocations throughout the year.

Hill, who is one of 17 employed on staff at the Foodbank in South County and in North County, said that about 180 different social programs receive donations from the organization. They include Transition House, the Rescue Mission, Unity Shoppe, Head Start programs and Catholic Charities. “We collect the items and give them out,” she said.

Head Start, the government program for pre-schoolers with classes spread throughout the county, gets food for meals and snacks, Hill said. “We probably provide all of their food.”

On the other end of the spectrum, the Foodbank sponsors the Brown Bag program for low-income seniors, at six sites in South County and four sites in North County. Volunteers fill brown bags with groceries and sundries, and hand them out at senior and community centers twice a month, all year long.

The distributions are completely run by volunteers, Hill said. Gesturing to a large white van, she added, “That’s our Mobile Pantry truck, that we load with 3,000 pounds of food. Volunteers help distribute to anyone who needs it.”

The South Coast area is known as an unusually wealthy and gracious community, but Hill had some statistics that were not so up-scale.

“There is a pressing need,” she said. “Approximately 50 percent of people are living below the poverty line in Santa Barbara County. About 70,000 people are served (by the Foodbank) in our area, and 45 percent are children.”

Hunger is not just painful and demoralizing, it has immediate consequences, perhaps most tellingly, for the young. “Nutrition is a basic need. Can’t do well on the job without it, can’t do well in school, can’t function in society.”

Many families, Hill said, put their earnings into rent, and there’s no money left over for food. Of course, seniors are also vulnerable. “Seniors, many have lived here all their lives,” she said. “They don’t have a lot of options so far as moving to a more affordable area.”

Donations to the Foodbank come from “all sorts of groups and individuals,” Hill said. “We get some directly from stores - Albertsons and Trader Joe’s. Some from growers. They bring it to us. We never know what we’re going to have in the warehouse. Some donations come directly from manufacturers, like Keebler and Nabisco.”

The Foodbank is a member of America’s Second Harvest, like many food banks, according to Hill. “That allows us to tap into sources of money and supplies.”

Among the items that the local Foodbank is always in need of are fresh produce - “That’s something we never get enough of” - and canned, non-perishable meats.And, at all times, “We’re very much in need of volunteers.”

This small warehouse operation, running for the most part on donations and volunteer labor, distributes an astonishing 5.1 million pounds of food and household items every year, Hill said.

And needy human beings are not the only beneficiaries. A pallet of pet food sat near the warehouse on Tuesday and Hill explained with a smile, “Some organizations have clients who have pets, so we contribute to Pet Food Waggin’. That’s a brand-new agency that makes home deliveries to seniors with pets, so they can keep their pets.”

PHOTO BY MARTHA LANNAN