Dear Friends,
I have been taking extra time in 2023 to reflect on the challenges of the past few years and appreciate the goodness and generosity of our communities across southeast Tennessee and northwest Georgia. We are grateful for the support of our wonderful volunteers, our most generous donors, and our super-hero community partners who continuously work to benefit communities both big and small, providing food to those who need it most. Our work is truly about neighbors helping neighbors.
Though we are finally moving beyond the pandemic, we are now experiencing an unprecedented hunger crisis caused by extraordinary inflation. Even so, I am hopeful and excited for the future. As we look ahead, we must take time to evaluate not only the daily work of providing hunger-relief, but also the larger systems and inequities that force so many of our neighbors to turn to charitable food assistance. Our leadership team is committed to increasing access to nutritious food and resources across our entire service area, and we are equally focused on addressing the broader systemic issues and finding more holistic approaches that help our families find pathways to stability. Food is a basic human right. Period. We can and will strive to do better.
For 2023, I’m aiming to tell our food bank story through a lens of joyfulness and possibility. We are going to have more tours in our facilities to showcase our broad network of partners to hear more “I had no idea!” comments. I want our brand to reflect our communities and our partners from the southernmost part of Chattooga County, Georgia, to the northernmost parts of Rhea and Van Buren County, Tennessee, so when people hear the name “Chattanooga Area Food Bank” they don’t question what we do, how we work, or who we serve. We are one food bank with one goal – to end hunger in every community across our 20 county service area.
Better Together,
Melissa Blevins President and Chief Executive Officer
“Share Your Christmas” Event IMPACT STORY
We are forever grateful for our close friends at Local 3 News! Because of their loyal partnership and media reach within the southeast Tennessee and northwest Georgia communities, the most recent Share Your Christmas was the most successful in the event’s 38-year history.
$471,988.37 was raised, and 93,330 pounds of food across 294 Food Drives was donated, culminating in enough groceries for 1,493,715 meals.
“I’ve worked at all 38 Share Your Christmas’s,” says Doug Loveridge, Production Manager and former board director of the food bank, “and each year I’m blown away by the generosity of people in the Chattanooga area. They continue to support the Chattanooga Area Food Bank. [I’m] very proud to be a member of the Local 3 News Crew and part of this great event every year.”
Cathy & Yvette VOLUNTEER SPOTLIGHT
Cathy started volunteering with the food bank four years ago. When asked why, she stated simply, “I want to serve, I want to give back.” She finds joy in serving others and the added bonus of making new friends who share her passion. Cathy serves at our Foxwood Food Center, where she often spends her time helping our guests shop for food. She shared her recent experience of volunteering during the holiday season.
“I met the sweetest soul yesterday while serving at the Food Bank. Yvette had stopped on her way home from receiving chemo.* She walked in haltingly with her cane, and though tired and ready to be home, she decided to get food as her doctor had suggested. Yvette lives on a limited income, as most do that seek food assistance. She admitted that she really had no appetite, but that she wanted to live for as long as she was able. As we stood by her car after I had loaded her groceries, she told me she’d be sick in a few hours after getting home, but in the next breath she expressed her gratitude to those who looked after her health. I suspect that this time next year she’ll be celebrating in heaven with her husband. She’s had to have been such a light to many over the years.
I feel saddened that such an endearing lady might be gone from this earth this time next year, but I’m ever so blessed that she found me and shared her precious time with me. It’s guests such as Yvette that serve me WAY more than I them. They gift me with a few steps into their journeys, and I walk away strengthened.”
For more information on volunteering at our Foxwood Food Center, email Kevin Lipski (klipski@chattfoodbank.org).
*Name changed to protect the privacy of our guest.
What is Food Bank Advocacy?
-By Jeannine Carpenter, Director of AdvocacyEveryone affiliated with the Food Bank – our staff, our neighbors who we serve, our board and our volunteers – are already advocates for our work and for our mission.
An advocacy professional in food banking, however, has a unique combination of responsibilities ranging from educating individuals to protecting funding, from establishing and maintaining relationships with policymakers to facilitating opportunities for people to access food more easily and more sustainably. That’s why the Chattanooga Area Food Bank hired its first ever Director of Advocacy last year.
The greatest value of advocacy to both the Food Bank and to our elected officials is a relationship based on the shared interest of elevating our communities and our states to be places full of opportunity and economic possibility. The most important components in making advocacy effective are research and dissemination of information.
Advocacy, at its core, is helping everyone understand not just WHAT we do as a food bank, but WHY we have to do it. WHY people need our help – even if they may be working full-time at one or more jobs. WHY food is the easiest assistance for people to access in times of emergency. And HOW food and access to food havew significant lifelong impacts on children. HOW people and businesses can help.
The best part about an advocacy program is that it’s an opportunity for everyone to be involved. Change happens when everyone who wants to see it speaks up and makes it happen. Together, we’ll become a force of advocacy for the food bank. Together, we’ll fight the root causes of hunger.
ADVOCACY BLOGPlant a Row Campaign
Do you have a favorite childhood gardening memory? Maybe you can recall picking and eating sun-ripened tomatoes with grandma or planting beans with dad and waiting in anticipation to eat the fruits of your labor. Or perhaps you’ve been building those memories with your little ones in recent summers. Food memories are evocative, bringing us back not only to the food we consumed, but also to the time and place. We feel comforted when we prepare and consume foods that connect us to our history and culture.
While some among us are lucky enough to have the space and resources to grow comforting and nourishing foods, many people in our service area do not.
That’s why the CAFB Garden Program is kicking off our inaugural “Plant a Row” campaign in April 2023. If you’re planting a summer garden, consider adding an extra row and donate that row’s produce to the food bank. To sign up for the campaign, join us in our garden (located behind our main warehouse at 2009 Curtain Pole Rd) April 26th through April 29th from 9:30am to 12pm each day. You’ll receive a free starter kit that includes seed packets and seedlings.*
Plant a Row harvest can be dropped off at any location, Mon-Thurs from 9am to 12pm or 1pm to 4pm and will be used in our emergency hunger-relief programs across our community. For more information, email Laura Robinson (larobinson@chattfoodbank.org).
*While supplies last
Louise Bain, Agency Relations Manager, Rural Tennessee STAFF SPOTLIGHT
Louise joined the food bank in 2019 as Agency Relations Manager, overseeing 10 rural Tennessee counties in our service area. She leads a network of more than 60 agency partners, working to increase capacity, provide technical assistance, and develop innovative ways to reduce food insecurity. Louise says that addressing hunger in rural areas “presents unique challenges that often require creative solutions. I enjoy working with our rural Tennessee partners. They are dedicated to feeding their neighbors in need, often delivering food to those who live in more isolated areas who do not have transportation.”
A native Floridian, Louise grew up in North Fort Myers. Prior to relocating to Tennessee to be closer to her family, she served as Programs Outreach Manager at Harry Chapin Food Bank of Southwest Florida for six years, managing their mobile pantry operations and child feeding programs. Her strong beliefs that no one should go hungry and we should all help one another drive her passion for her work.
She is a mother of three, Wesley, Courtney, and Emily, and grandmother to Takoda, Avery, and Zoey. She returned to college in 2020 to fulfill her dream of completing her degree, and in May 2022, she graduated from Tusculum University with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. She recently gave the keynote address at Tennessee Wesleyan University’s inaugural fundraiser for its Love Thy Neighbor Project (a McMinn County partner agency). When not “food banking” she enjoys gardening, cooking, antiquing, and genealogy. Louise is “proud to work for an organization that cares deeply about our community and with people who live the food bank’s mission every day.”
Main Warehouse 2009 Curtain Pole Rd. Chattanooga, TN 37406
