$1 = 4 Meals

"Think locally, act locally," said Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks. "Be involved by advocating, raising awareness, volunteering or donating your time, your talent or your treasure."

Ohio's poverty rate dropped and the median household income rose last year, according to new U.S. Census Bureau reports. "Any reduction in poverty is a good thing," said Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks. "We're seven years out from the end of the great recession and this is the first positive sign. Their lives are better." But there is still a "tremendous" amount of work that needs to be done, Hamler-Fugitt said.

"Fourteen-point-eight percent of Ohioans are still living in poverty," said Joree Novotny, director of communications for the Ohio Association of Foodbanks. "There's still a really high percentage of folks that are living paycheck to paycheck." Making enough to climb above the federal poverty level is a good step, Novotny said, but it's not the final benchmark to look at because families making 200 percent of that level still qualify for help from foodbanks.