After 15 years at the aid organization CARE, where he confronted conflict, earthquakes, tsunamis and other disasters, Thomas Reynolds, the CEO of Northwest Harvest in Seattle, understood the “absolute” importance of being prepared for the Covid-19 virus. So early on, he did what you do in these situations and devised…
Food Bank News
Jon Stepanian had some great ideas about how to impose social distancing at the five large weekly food distributions he oversees throughout Long Island and Brooklyn, including having clients show up within certain time periods, depending on their age. Those good intentions, however, have not necessarily translated into streamlined distributions…
To protect the health of its senior volunteers during the Covid-19 crisis, Three Square Food Bank has instituted a top-to-bottom reorg of its network of about 160 pantries and agencies. In the space of about six hours on Monday, March 16, the Las Vegas-based food bank devised a plan that…
Michael Guerra of San Antonio Food Bank was sitting in a meeting about the food bank’s coronavirus contingency plan when he thought back to a chance encounter he’d had that morning: a food-insecure client of the food bank was lamenting the inability to acquire reserve food, when it was already…
Sunshine Division, a hunger-relief agency in Portland, Ore., is getting food delivered to people who need it through what amounts to a volunteer brigade available all hours of the day and night, every day of the week. The nimble delivery squad consists of members of the Portland Police Department who…
Food banks might agree that they need to distribute healthy foods, but they haven’t always agreed on exactly which foods are healthy. Now a set of nutrition guidelines created specifically for the charitable food system is aiming to solve that problem. Just over half of food banks already use some…
As a former chef and restaurant owner, Greg Silverman knows a thing or two about how to get the best food at the best price. That knowledge helped him reduce by nearly 20% the cost of purchasing food for the mega-pantry he runs and three other pantries, all in New…
New leaders naturally bring perspectives shaped by their backgrounds and experiences. In the case of Luis Guardia, the new President of Food Research and Action Center, those perspectives are global. Guardia most recently served as a high-level executive at Global Impact, a DC-based non-profit that provides fundraising and other services…
Foodlink’s Curbside Market looks like a typical mobile pantry, but it’s actually so much more. Besides improving access to fruits and vegetables in low-income neighborhoods, Curbside Market is prepping to become the nation’s first mobile provider of WIC staples. Plus, it’s advancing a new model for fruit and vegetable prescriptions,…