Second Harvest North Florida 1502 Jessie Street Jacksonville, FL 32206 WeNourishHope.org twitter.com/wenourishhope facebook.com/wenourishhope
$1 can provide 7 meals
Since 1979, Second Harvest North Florida’s mission has been providing food resources to hungry people. Second Harvest works within a vast network of resources and partners – including food and financial donors, a dedicated staff, volunteers that help manage the work load and agencies that distribute meals to families and individuals in need.
As impossible as it sounds, for every dollar that is donated, Second Harvest North Florida can provide seven meals to the hungry in our community. How do we accomplish this? Here are some of the key factors that make this achievement a reality:
In 2010, we provided food for 14,670,490 meals in north Florida. More than 170,700 people received emergency food. This is an 85% increase over the amount of food we distributed in 2009, but it still is not enough to eliminate hunger in our community.
Sources of food. We are constantly finding and cultivating food sources to create a supply of economical, nutritious food for distribution. Relationships with corporate wholesale and retail food suppliers let us acquire surplus food – often for just the cost to pick it up. We work closely with local organizations and area farmers to save fresh produce that might otherwise be plowed under or destroyed. Community food drives through churches, businesses, schools and individuals help to stock our shelves, and we receive food products from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).
As proud as we are of our accomplishments in 2010, our goal for 2011 must be higher to meet the still growing demand for food. We will need to provide 17.7 million meals to help those who would otherwise be hungry. We hope you will help us in this effort by volunteering at the food bank, hosting a food drive or making a financial gift. Hunger is a solvable problem. No one needs to go hungry, today, tomorrow or any day. You can help make this a reality in every community.
Efficient operations. Second Harvest North Florida has warehouse distribution operations in Jacksonville, St. Augustine, Gainesville and Lake City. At these operation centers food is collected, sorted, boxed and distributed to agencies that work directly with people in need of food. Volunteer labor. In 2010, Second Harvest benefited from more than 12,500 hours of work provided by over 2,600 volunteers. This translates into employee cost savings and means more money can be spent on getting food to hungry people.
E STRUGGLE TO MAKE ENDS MEET. I TRY TO FEED MY KIDS FIRST AND ME LAST.” “I WORK WITH CLIENTS WHO DO NOT ALWAYS HAVE ENOUGH FOOD TO EAT. THEY ARE CHILDREN AND MANY TIMES THEY CAN N NCENTRATE ON THEIR STUDIES, BECAUSE THEIR PARENTS DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH FOOD IN THE HOME.” “IT DOESN’T HAPPEN OFTEN [THAT WE HAVE TO USE THE FOOD BANK], ONLY WHEN WORK SLOWS DOW E DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO AVOID IT.” “WE STRUGGLE TO MAKE ENDS MEET. I TRY TO FEED MY KIDS FIRST AND ME LAST.” “I WORK WITH CLIENTS WHO DO NOT ALWAYS HAVE ENOUGH FOOD TO EAT. THEY A ILDREN AND MANY TIMES THEY CAN NOT CONCENTRATE ON THEIR STUDIES, BECAUSE THEIR PARENTS DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH FOOD IN THE HOME. “IT DOESN’T HAPPEN OFTEN [THAT WE HAVE TO USE THE FOO NK], ONLY WHEN WORK SLOWS DOWN. WE DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO AVOID IT.” “EVERY MONTH A CHURCH, AFFILIATED WITH YOU ALL, BRINGS ME PLENTY OF FOOD. I COULD NEVER SHOW HOW MUCH IT
Reaching the hungry Second Harvest North Florida feeds the hungry by working through more than 400 agencies across 18 counties of north Florida – 200 agencies in Duval County alone. Our role is to collect and then distribute massive amounts of food — shelf-stable, frozen and fresh — to organizations that directly serve people in need. We work through agencies that prepare and serve meals to the homeless – feeding sites like The Sulzbacher Center, Salvation Army, City Rescue Mission and many smaller, neighborhood centers. We support organizations that hand out bags of groceries so families and seniors can make ends meet — food pantries like BEAM, Household of Faith Ministries and hundreds of pantries operating in places of worship of every faith. Through partners like Shands Jacksonville and the Jacksonville Farmer’s Market, we are working to provide fresh and nutritious food to help with critical community issues such as infant mortality, childhood obesity and Type 2 diabetes, which disproportionately affect low-income families.
Our Kids Cafe and Summer Lunch programs provide nutritious after-school snacks and hot summer lunches to agencies that serve the youngest members of our community. Through our BackPack program, we send healthy food home with children for weekends and school breaks to help feed them when school is not in session. We support children’s programs at the Police Athletic League, Boys and Girls Club, Reed Educational Campus and many others. The agencies we serve tell us that the need for food is still growing as the economy continues its slow recovery. Their lines are longer and their resources are stretched to the limit to feed the hungry. As quickly as we can, we need to increase our ability to support these agencies in their work.
The faces of the hungry Spend one day at a local food pantry and you will find that the faces of the hungry are as varied as their stories.
It is likely that you know someone today — a neighbor, your child’s teacher or the checkout person at a store where you shop — who is suffering from food insecurity. A sad fact is that one out of every four children in America is hungry.
• They are seniors who have had to choose between buying food or their medications. • They are parents who lost jobs and have swallowed their pride to put food on the table. • They are children who head to school without breakfast because today it was not their turn to eat. • They are newly homeless families who have turned to shelters for lifesaving support.
That is why we have joined with Feeding America, the nation’s food network that includes Second Harvest North Florida and more than 200 other food banks, to end hunger in America by 2015. Our goal is to strengthen the network of services available in north Florida so that hunger and food insecurity ceases to exist. There will always be people needing our help; we want to have food available to them when they need it.
E STRUGGLE TO MAKE ENDS MEET. I TRY TO FEED MY KIDS FIRST AND ME LAST.” “I WORK WITH CLIENTS WHO DO NOT ALWAYS HAVE ENOUGH FOOD T. THEY ARE CHILDREN AND MANY TIMES THEY CAN NOT CONCENTRATE ON THEIR STUDIES, BECAUSE THEIR PARENTS DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH FOOD IN THE HOME.” “IT DOESN’T HAPPEN OFTEN [THAT WE HAVE TO USE T OD BANK], ONLY WHEN WORK SLOWS DOWN. WE DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO AVOID IT.” “WE STRUGGLE TO MAKE ENDS MEET. I TRY TO FEED MY KIDS FIRST AND ME LAST.” “I WORK WITH CLIENTS WHO DO NOT ALWA VE ENOUGH FOOD TO EAT. THEY ARE CHILDREN AND MANY TIMES THEY CAN NOT CONCENTRATE ON THEIR STUDIES, BECAUSE THEIR PARENTS DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH FOOD IN THE HOME. “IT DOESN’T HAPPEN OFT HAT WE HAVE TO USE THE FOOD BANK], ONLY WHEN WORK SLOWS DOWN. WE DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO AVOID IT.” “EVERY MONTH A CHURCH, AFFILIATED WITH YOU ALL, BRINGS ME PLENTY OF FOOD. I COULD NEV