The nonprofit Emergency Feeding Program of Seattle and King County says requests for emergency grocery bags is up over 25 percent over last year, while donations to the program have remained essentially static.

As the holiday season approaches, it is unclear whether there will be enough food available to meet the needs of our most vulnerable neighbors. Through the end of the year, local families, businesses, and faith communities can drop off non-perishable food at all 33 Seattle Fire Stations as part of a citywide effort to meet this growing need.

Emergency Feeding Program Executive Director Arthur Lee said this is the eighth year that firefighters have worked with the program to gather food for hungry households in the city.

"It is truly inspiring that these individuals, who are so often called to put their lives on the line to protect our lives and our property, also put their hearts and hands to work helping feed those who are struggling," Lee said.

He noted that most of the families that turn to Emergency Feeding Program for help are hardworking folks who are being squeezed by high food and fuel prices and increasing housing and utilities costs and are sometimes ill prepared to deal with the unexpected expenses that too often blindside us all.

"A car breaking down, an unusually large heating bill, an illness or injury that requires a doctor's visit - any of these things can force a family into having to make an impossible choice: Do I pay the bills or do I feed my family."

Typically, Emergency Feeding Program packs and distributes some 20,000 nutritionally balanced food bags - the equivalent of 340,000 meals - to some 57,000 people in King County each year. But this has been no typical year.

"Right now we are delivering nearly 1,000 more bags per month that last year," Lee says. "There's just a lot of suffering going on out there. Our Holiday Food Drive is an opportunity for this community to come together to really do something for our struggling neighbors."

"The important thing," Lee says, "especially at this time of year, is that we open our eyes and hearts to the problem of local hunger. This community is too strong, too committed to allow anyone to send their kids to bed hungry tonight."

A list of Emergency Feeding Program's "most-needed" foods is available on their website at www.emergencyfeeding.org or one can be requested by calling them at 329.0300.