An exclusive newsletter for our Hunger Heroes
What’s INSIDE You’re Giving Retired Texans Something to be Proud Of Food Banker Profile: Kara Hedlund, Mobile Pantry Supervisor You Made a Big Impact on Hurricane Harvey Relief
Fall 2017
Food Banker Profile Kara Hedlund, Mobile Pantry Supervisor
You’re Giving Retired Texans Something To Be Proud Of KIDSGIVING 2017 November 4, 2017, 9-11 a.m. Anyone can be involved in the fight against hunger – including your little ones! The Food Bank will be hosting its annual children’s open house on Saturday, November 4th. Kick off the holiday season with a morning of fighting hunger in Central Texas. Families of all ages are welcome to experience the Food Bank. Kids will have a chance to sort food donations, learn about our garden, take a picture on a forklift, and more. Tickets are $25 per family. Purchase tickets and get more information at kidsgiving2017.eventbrite.com If you have any questions, please contact contribute@centraltexasfoodbank.org or call (512) 220-2680.
2
It’s a good day for Keith. Today he is at Shepherd’s Heart Food Pantry, where he will volunteer his time and take food home for himself. Struggling with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), Keith does not always feel fit to leave his house, but makes the most of it when he can. A native of the Waco area, Keith is now retired and living on a fixed income. He has persevered through hard times – he lost his wife to cancer and endured homelessness for a time. However, Keith tries to stay positive by making connections with the community through the pantry. “It’s a good thing because now I’m able to get a lot more help. And people are willing to help when you change your whole life around,” he says of the generosity he’s received.
I’m not greedy and still I share and help out friends when they’re hungry. “I’ve got a little food to last me until the end
of the month. I use this as my supplement. I do pretty good for a person who’s retired,” says Keith. As he picks out food from the pantry, Keith points out items he will take home, and mentions that he appreciates receiving tuna for the protein content. Keith especially likes the honeydew and watermelon that are great for keeping him hydrated. A self-proclaimed “juicer”, Keith enjoys the nutritious produce that is available to make juices and smoothies. “The food has been helping a lot. I’m not greedy and still I share and help out friends when they’re hungry, so I’m able to volunteer and I give a little bit.” Keith enjoys volunteering at the pantry as well, because he knows he is giving back to the community that also serves him. “The community has helped me out, so I’m appreciative and thankful for some of the blessings that have come upon me,” says Keith. A proud Texan, Keith is grateful for the community support he receives thanks to Food Bank donors. “Thank you!” he says, “Thank you so much.”
Kara Hedlund and her team serve about 15,000 Central Texans in need each month at 40 Mobile Food Pantry sites. The Mobile Food Pantry program fills geographic and service gaps in emergency food assistance by providing Central Texans in need with basic staples, fruits and vegetables, and frozen foods where local food assistance services cannot keep up with demand. We sat down with Kara to get the latest updates on the Mobile Food Pantry program. Q Hi, Kara! How long have you worked at the Food Bank? About 16 months. Q How often do you go out with the Mobile Food Pantries? Right now I’m at distributions eight days a month, but depending on what’s going on with a site I may jump on the truck for additional visits. There are two coordinators on the team who are out five days a week, one distribution a day, Tuesday through Saturday. Q What’s the earliest that the coordinators get here to go out with our trucks? 6:15 a.m. is the earliest, and our drivers get here around 4 in the morning. Q What’s changed with the Mobile Pantry program since you first started?
Now we’re starting to do mobile fresh-foodonly distributions. It’s our Fresh Food For Families Program, but it’s mobile. Q How has the reception been? The overwhelming response is, “Thank you, we’ve been needing access to fresh produce. We like it, our kids like it.” I was shocked by the demand! We’re serving over 175 households at some distributions. This also benefits our warehouse – the last thing we want to do is compost produce that we can’t get out fast enough. Q What else is new? We’ve recently added eight new Mobile Pantry sites, and we have a beautiful new truck! Q Where are we adding our new Mobile Pantry sites? One is at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Austin, right down the street from the new Food Bank. Our first distribution there was in August and was specifically geared towards veterans. Our site leader and the program partner is the Supportive Services for Veteran Families department within the VA, which works with very low-income veterans about to lose their home. We’re also adding sites this year through partnerships with school districts in Del Valle and Lockhart, and we have a site onboarding in Pflugerville at Shoreline Church. That’s a high need area where we’ve had two
partners that had to close. Q Your team is out there every day directly serving people who need help with food. You’re the face of our mission in a lot of ways. What have you seen that inspires you and keeps you going? Our senior clients, when they tell you how little they’re living on. As you’re walking everything to their car for them, they’re telling you, “If I didn’t have access to this food, I don’t know what I would do at the end of this month.” They say just how thankful they are. I’m also always blown away by how many of the volunteers, as I get to know them, are clients as well. They’re so dedicated to being a part of their community. I had one volunteer I had worked with for months. After the distribution, he was going through the line to get his own food, and I asked him, “You don’t want any meat today?” He said, “I don’t have anywhere to put it. I’m homeless.” I had no idea that he was living in a tent. And still, he came to volunteer and for three solid hours was of service to his community. All along he knew that waiting until the end of distribution he might not get certain food items if we ran out – or there might not be any food left at all. Volunteering was just feeding him in a different way. This interview has been condensed for Hunger Heroes. You can read the complete conversation with Kara at centraltexasfoodbank.org/foodbanker
3
Dear Friend,
As I write this, we are just a few weeks removed from the most devastating hurricane to ever hit Texas. It has been a humbling experience to work at the Food Bank in the aftermath of this storm. The outpouring of generosity has been inspiring. When we closed our doors on Friday before Hurricane Harvey, we could only speculate about the effects of the storm. By Sunday morning, it was clear that the role of food banks in the recovery efforts would be immense. We quickly mobilized and poured resources into the hardest hit areas of the state, some of which were in La Grange, just 65 miles from the Central Texas Food Bank warehouse. As the flood waters began to recede, we were able to open new channels of distribution and ship large quantities of frozen protein to mobile kitchens in the hardest hit areas, build and ship hygiene kits for people with no access to clean running water, and create emergency boxes with pop-top and shelf stable food for families in hotels and homes with no electricity. By the Thursday following the storm, a shelter for evacuees opened just 300 yards from the Central Texas Food Bank. We quickly began cooking and delivering healthy breakfasts for the 350 evacuees who had been placed at the facility, and worked with volunteers and city officials to keep the shelter stocked with water and other resources. I had the honor of witnessing the talented and passionate staff of the Food Bank rise to the occasion of serving our neighbors who had been impacted by this devastation. As we got to work and provided aid after the storm, you all did your job as well. The generosity from our community was aweinspiring. We simply could not have tackled this incredible challenge without the time and treasure shared by our supporters. We continue to do our part in the long term recovery efforts, but we must stay focused on the pervasive hunger that plagues Central Texas all year long. Looking ahead, we need to replenish our inventory and gear up for what is always a time of incredibly high need during the holiday season. Thankfully, it’s never been clearer that our community will not turn its back on those who need help. Mark Jackson Chief Development Officer
THANK YOU CAPITAL CAMPAIGN DONORS
YOU MADE A BIG IMPACT ON HURRICANE HARVEY RELIEF
In our letter from the CDO, you read about the generosity of the Texas community in a time of dire and ongoing need. The Central Texas Food Bank’s response to Hurricane Harvey will continue for months, and that is only possible because we have increased physical capacity in our new facility. In June of 2016, we moved to a building that more than doubled our overall square footage. This made it possible for us to rapidly respond in the first days of relief efforts. Therefore, we must especially thank our visionary Capital Campaign donors and supporters who made the new Food Bank a reality. When we set out to build the new Food Bank, located on Metropolis Drive in Austin, we knew we needed more space to support daily operations, food distribution and volunteer efforts. We also knew it was essential to plan for the unthinkable – a situation like Hurricane Harvey. This proved to be important forethought. Thanks to our new facility’s expanded size, we were able to maintain daily operations serving 46,000 Central Texans while absorbing over 900,000 lbs of additional product specifically for Harvey relief over the first three weeks following the storm. Jeff Gonzales, Director of Operations, shared how going from two loading docks in the old facility, to 15 in the new building was a game changer: “Now we can absorb disaster support deliveries without impacting core business.” Jeff also mentioned that layout of our Product Recovery volunteer space has been a direct benefit. “Ergonomic layout of PR increased product flow and volunteer capacity by 40%. We’ve produced over 17 truckloads of disaster relief boxes in a week’s period and still maintain core business. These disaster boxes were distributed to 5 fellow food banks directly impacted by Harvey, along with several partner agencies.” Heath Ribordy, Director of Agency Services, said, “Our expanded capacity allows the operations team to receive and store product on behalf of food banks that were greatly impacted by Harvey. The old facility would have never allowed us the freedom to hold these products and would have limited us.” The Food Bank’s building on Metropolis is a gift that keeps on giving. Thank you, again, to our supporters who stood with us in the lofty goal of constructing this new facility.
Our Mission: To nourish hungry people and lead the community in the fight against hunger. A member of 6500 Metropolis Dr., Austin, TX 78744 | 512.282.2111 | centraltexasfoodbank.org