Sportsmen Against Hunger

Eight years ago, the Sportsmen Against Hunger program was started in North Dakota by the North Dakota Community Action Partnership (NDCAP) after assessing the state’s needs. What they found was that a number of people, statewide, weren’t getting enough food. After observing this, they started a venison donation program in order to help those low-income participants that didn’t have enough food to feed themselves and their families.

North Dakota hunters can choose to donate their deer meat to the program. The cost of the processing at participating processors is covered or if you pay for it, your costs are tax deductible.

The participating processor for Region 1 is Old School Meat Processing out of Alexander. Region 1 covers Divide, Williams and McKenzie counties. Due to labor shortages, Old School Meat Processing is short of help, so they have requested that all deer brought in be skinned and prepared, or skinned and quartered. They are normally open from 9-5, but please call first. Old School Meat Processing is located at 14444 18th St NW in Alexander and can be reached at 701-828-3050.

The Sportsmen Against Hunger program took in 201 deer in the 2011 bow and rifle season, which can feed a decent number of families. In addition to that, the program also received 148 cow elk after partnering with the Theodore Roosevelt National Park elk reduction project. Sportsmen Against Hunger secured funding to have the elk processed and then distributed to food pantries and charitable food outlets across the state of ND.

Community Action is looking to expand the program and to continue help provide a lean quality protein source to individuals across the state that are struggling to meet their daily food needs.

For more information about the Sportsmen Against Hunger program, call the NDCAP at 1-800-726-7960 or check out their website at: http://www.capnd.org/sahprogram/.