An oil and gas company in Platteville recently donated $3,000 to a local food bank to help feed 40 low-income children who might otherwise go hungry over weekends, officials said.
Calfrac Well Services Corp. — a Canadian company that opened a field office in Platteville in 2002 — donated the money to the Weld Food Bank when it heard the children needed help, said the food bank’s executive director, Leona Martens.
The donation went to the Food Bank’s Backpack program, which helps low-income kids who don’t get regular meals on the weekends, Martens said.
Many children who received free and reduced-cost breakfast and lunch at school are vulnerable to hunger over the weekends, when school feeding programs are unavailable, Martens said.
School districts help to identify kids whose weekend nutritional needs aren’t met. Then volunteers at the food bank assemble child-friendly food packages to be distributed to the children on Friday afternoons, she said.
Martens lauded Calfrac for wanting to give back to the 2,700 or so residents of Platteville, which is about 25 miles south of Greeley just off U.S. 85.
“For $75, we can provide a backpack full of food to a child every weekend during the school year,” Martens said. “The Calfrac donations will ensure that 40 children are well-fed and ready to learn when they return to school on Monday morning.”
Calfrac — which has about 800 employees worldwide — supplies a variety of products and services, including hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas exploration.
Several oil and gas companies are working in Weld County to tap into the massive Niobrara shale formation that stretches from southwestern Weld County to Wyoming and east to Nebraska.
Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907 or mwhaley@denverpost.com
