Image courtesy of Hoover Helps
The Hoover Bucs and Spain Park Jags are competing to see who can raise the most money for Hoover Helps in the 2024 Hunger Challenge.
The Spain Park Jags are looking to reclaim their title as champions of the Hoover Hunger Challenge over the Hoover Bucs this week as the two schools battle it out to see who can raise the most money for Hoover Helps.
Hoover Helps is a nonprofit that works with companies and faith-based organizations to provide food and meet needs for needy children in Hoover.
The Hunger Challenge is held each year on the same week that the Spain Park Jags and Hoover Bucs face off in football.
Spain Park raised the most money four years in a row and, last year, it initially was announced that the Jags had won a fifth year in a row (by $803) until it was discovered that a $10,000 check from a Hoover Bucs fan had come in the mail on the last day of the competition and had been overlooked.
The $10,000 check pushed Hoover way over the top of Spain and resulted in final totals of $27,421 given by Hoover fans and $18,224 given by Spain Park fans.
The grand total of $45,645 was a record for the Hunger Challenge, “almost double what we normally do,” said Greg Bishop, one of the founders of Hoover Helps. The group hopes to at least match that amount this year, but “it’s going to be tough,” Bishop said.
As of Wednesday night, Hoover fans were leading this year, with donations totaling $10,420, while Spain Park fans had donated $5,585.
Fans can go ahead and make their donations by going to the hooverhelps.org website, texting hooverhelps to 56651, giving through venmo @hooverhelps or “just writing big fat checks,” Bishop said. People are encouraged to indicate for which school they are donating.
The nonprofit also will have tables set up for both the Bucs and the Jags at the main entrance to Friday night’s football game at the Hoover Met for people to give cash or checks. The game is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m., but the tables should remain open for cash and check donations through halftime, Bishop said.
About 500 children in Hoover have been identified as “food insecure,” and many more likely have not been identified, Bishop said.
Children who depend on free or reduced-priced meals at school because of their family’s income level may be at risk of hunger on weekends, holidays and over the summer when schools are closed.
“Food insecurity is devastating for children,” the organization says. “Not getting proper nutrition impacts a child’s physical and mental health. It’s associated with delayed development, poor academic performance, increased risk of chronic illness and behavioral problems. Children can’t concentrate in class and miss more school days due to illnesses.”
Hoover Helps partners with faith-based organizations and other entities to provide food for children to take home from school in their backpacks for the weekends and partners with the Neighborhood Bridges Hoover organization to meet other needs of children. Last year, 2,810 individual needs were met through Neighborhood Bridges, Bishop said.
To find out more, go to hooverhelps.org.
Editor's note: This article was updated at 12:01 a.m. Thursday with donation totals as of Wednesday night.
