DES MOINES, Iowa — Grand View University held its Longest Table event for the second year in a row Sunday evening.

Rachelle Keck, the President of Grand View University, said that the event is a chance for neighbors to come together and talk about issues the east side faces.

“The event tonight (Sunday) is really about breaking bread together and getting to know your neighbors in this beautiful, beautiful fall setting that we have here,” Keck said.

Grand View University partners with the Food Bank of Iowa to spotlight food insecurity across the east side of Des Moines.

“We actually have a food insecurity problem with many of our students on campus and so we have a formal food bank partnership and a location here on our campus. So, it just made absolute sense for us to work together and really use this event as an opportunity to lift up this issue that is very real to east side residents here in Des Moines,” Keck said.

Food insecurity was a timely topic to highlight following the USDA’s announcement of discontinuing reporting food insecurity data.

Tami Nielsen, the CEO of the Food Bank of Iowa, said that the USDA’s decision will make the food banks job more difficult.

“It’s one more data point that we won’t have, and it’s a consistent data point, as I said, that has been collected for three decades across all administrations and so not having that accurate information, you know, where you can look at those historical trends and those historical numbers from the USDA’s reports, it causes just that interruption of knowledge. It also doesn’t accurately show those outcomes from those federal cuts,” Keck said.