I am absolutely exhausted from a triple dose of Seattle food banks. Early this morning, I returned to Cherry Street food bank to observe mother/baby day and talk to the administrative staff. On Thursdays each week, Cherry Street changes its food line to baby formula, food, and toiletries and opens its doors only to women with children five and under. It is their slowest day, with only about 200 women throughout the day. Next, I met with Kim Nelson, the Community Affairs Director for Northwest Harvest. Once again, Northwest Harvest blew my mind with the astounding scale of their operations. Kim and her team are responsible for raising ten million dollars each year to purchase the more than 24 million pounds of food that is distributed to 330 food banks and, of course, to pay the salaries of the hard working staff. Today alone, she had a fund-raising goal of $40,000. This support is largely derived from individual donors paying small checks. Northwest Harvest has a 30,000-person mailing list and a 10,000-person donor base. Kim was full of incredible insight into the world of non-profit fund-raising. She has two rules by which she lives: she asks for four dollars for every one dollar she actually needs and she requires her staff to interact with a donor seven times between a donation and the next time they ask for money. Additionally, money and resources for Northwest Harvest are raised through thousands of food drives a year (600 drives in December alone!) and 17 signature events each year, all of which are facilitated by companies or individuals who want to give back.
Next, I talked with Elise DeGooyer, who is the program manager for Northwest Harvest. She and her staff are in constant communication with the 330 food banks that receive food from Northwest Harvest. These food banks range in dependency from 5% to 100%. Northwest Harvest distributes food for free to any food bank in the State. Their only requirement is that no client of a food bank can be denied food from Northwest Harvest, even if the food bank's clientele policy does not allow them to give that client the full food bank service. Elise told me that food banks across the state have seen a roughly 50% increase in demand in the past three years. In the past year or so, that demand has leveled off, but it has not dropped. This data matches up with what we have experienced at the Hunger Coalition.
After lunch, I took a bus (I am on my way to mastering the Seattle bus system) to Saint Mary's. Saint Mary's runs a moderately large food bank out of a church basement. It is not religiously affiliated and is very similar to Cherry Street. Like Cherry Street, it has no client screening system. Clients are only asked to show identification and are entered into the system so that they cannot come more than once a week. Saint Mary's receives food from Northwest Harvest, Food Lifeline, and a few major grocery stores in the area. Saint Mary's serves around 400 clients each day and requires between fifteen and thirty volunteers per day to work in the warehouse and food line. I found the food selection here to be quite strange: they had a lot of variety and types of food, however, a large proportion of it was unhealthy. There was a box each of ring pops, otter pops, cake mix, cheesecake mix, cakes, and pie filling. Many clients who came through the line refused substantial food like tuna and potatoes but loaded up on sponge cake and pie filling. Most of these sweet items come from the grocery stores, but I am of the opinion that it is better to throw Oreo cakes and ring pops away rather than give the empty, unhealthy calories out to clients. Saint Mary's also operates one of the largest home delivery services in Seattle. Multiple times each week, vans go out into the poorest neighborhoods to deliver food boxes to clients who are too ill or disabled to come to the food bank. They also create no-cook boxes specifically for homeless clients, about 20 of which are handed out each day.
Finally, I headed to Jewish Family Services for a quick orientation to their food bank. More on that later...I will be volunteering with them tomorrow morning. It is time to sleep and play with my brand new iPhone!
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Northwest Harvest
Today I officially began my Senior Project. I awoke at 6:30 (but, hey, at least I can't complain about how early 6:30 is because I have no idea what time zone my body is actually on) and headed off into the gray drizzle to catch a bus alone for the very first time. After a confusing hour of walking to/waiting for/missing the bus, I arrived at Cherry Street Food Bank. Cherry Street Food Bank is an offshoot of Northwest Harvest, the largest non-profit food distribution center in Washington. Northwest Harvest is a gargantuan organization that provides food to more than 300 food banks in Washington. Additionally, they run Cherry Street Food Bank, which, in itself is an incredibly large undertaking. From 9:00 to 5:30 four days a week, Cherry Street Food Bank provides groceries to more than 3,000 people each day. Serving between 15,000 and 20,000 people a month, Cherry Street is the largest food bank in Washington and most likely the largest food bank on the West Coast.
I started my day with Cherry Street handing out apples. The layout of the distribution is fairly simple: clients come through the courtyard on the left, choose either a sack lunch or a distribution line with grains, beans, and soups and then proceed to the produce line for vegetables, potatoes, and bread before departing the courtyard on the right. At my station, each client chose two apples from a box containing a variety of slightly bruised, abnormally small, or otherwise undesirable apples. This ran quite smoothly as each client filed past and dutifully picked the perfect imperfect pair of apples. It ran smoothly, that is, until the little old Asian women came along. Anywhere you go, the people that are in need of food assistance are a tough group. Those in the Cherry Street line looked tougher than normal. These are people that are rough around the edges; tattered and worn down from months without the certainty of a shelter or hot meal. Many are missing teeth, sport menacing tattoos, and have uncertain mental instabilities. For the most part, all of these clients mastered the art of picking two, and only two, apples from the bin. But the sly, Asian women, all of whom were under five feet and looked innocent and grandmotherly, would stealthily take three, four, even five apples from the bin. I would firmly ask them to return their stolen apples but they would smile unknowing, gap-toothed smiles and slink away. There are many ways in which appearances can be deceiving.
Northwest Harvest is unique in its firm commitment to open accesibility. No one who comes to Cherry Street is required to answer any questions. Their presence in the line is enough; they will receive food that day. To uphold this mission, Northwest Harvest cannot receive any government funding because government-funded organization are required to implement client screening. I find this model and the passionate way in which the staff and volunteers at Northwest Harvest defended to be quite surprising. At the Hunger Coalition, we never refuse anyone food, but we maintain an intimate relationship with our clients through check-ups, goals, and referrals. For Cherry Street and its 3,000 clients per day, six week check-ups and one-on-one time with clients would be impossible. Yet, I would have liked to see more data about the number, ethnic makeup, and reason for hunger of the people Cherry Street serves. From my own observations and my talks with the volunteers and staff, I would say the clients are 40% Asian, 35% Caucasian, 20% African American, 3% Middle Eastern, and 2% Native American. Many are homeless, many have serious mental disabilities, and many are addicted to drugs and alcohol. Yet, nearly every client seemed comfortable with the volunteers and the set-up of the distribution. They recognized and interacted with volunteers and thanked us repeatedly for helping. A note on volunteers: Cherry Street inspires incredible loyalty in its volunteers. I talked to one woman who has been volunteering for them every week for twenty-two years. Others, when asked if they were a long-time volunteer, would shrug and say, "Not really, I have only volunteered for five or six years." This sort of commitment astonishes me. All of them cited the efficiency, clear mission, and constant appreciation that the receive at Cherry Street as the reason for their repeated return to the site. In total, Cherry Street requires 200 volunteers a week to stay afloat, or the equivalent of twenty-five full-time employees. Currently, they have a lengthy waiting list for volunteer openings.
Around 11:30, I moved inside to spend a few hours bagging coffee. As I said above, Northwest Harvest distributes food to more than 300 food banks across Washington. They have four warehouses across the state and transfer incredible quantities of food. I spoke with Mike, the wizard of a man responsible for obtaining all of the food for Northwest Harvest. His goal is to obtain and distribute twenty million pounds of food this year. Twenty million pounds. That is a mind-blowing number. Much of the produce is donated directly from local farmers who have slightly damaged or too much produce. Mike invented a system of transferring whole truck loads of frozen goods into freezers quickly enough that the food doesn't thaw. Previously, Northwest Harvest had to deny millions of pounds of frozen goods each year because they could not transfer them off the truck and into the freezer quickly enough. Now, an entire truck can be unloaded and transferred in a fraction of the original time. Mike has hundreds of stories about the clever solutions and magical transfers he has created. When he walks through the food bank, staff and volunteers alike gaze at him with adoring eyes. The grapefruit-carrot story, recounted to me by at least three people, is legendary. A few weeks ago, Northwest Harvest had a million pound surplus of frozen carrots. The clientele in Washington overwhelmingly dislikes carrots. Mike found a grapefruit and orange distributor in Arizona who would exchange a million pounds of carrots for a million pounds of grapefruit and oranges and provide the transportation for both shipments. The ingenuity and dedication of people like Mike keep the non-profit world and the people it serves alive.
The staff at Cherry Street Food Bank was wonderfully kind. Each member, from the food bank manager to the program director, took the time to ask about my project and answer all of my questions. They also referred me to a plethora of other organizations in the Seattle area. Tomorrow morning, I will once again battle the Seattle bus system and spend the morning with Cherry Street. Next, I will head to Saint Mary's Food Bank to see what a smaller, more religious food bank looks like. For now, to bed to dream of millions of pounds of grapefruit and carrots...
The Food Line heading into Cherry Street.
Two volunteer and me at the produce table.
Volunteers inside the warehouse working at the soup and grains table.
I started my day with Cherry Street handing out apples. The layout of the distribution is fairly simple: clients come through the courtyard on the left, choose either a sack lunch or a distribution line with grains, beans, and soups and then proceed to the produce line for vegetables, potatoes, and bread before departing the courtyard on the right. At my station, each client chose two apples from a box containing a variety of slightly bruised, abnormally small, or otherwise undesirable apples. This ran quite smoothly as each client filed past and dutifully picked the perfect imperfect pair of apples. It ran smoothly, that is, until the little old Asian women came along. Anywhere you go, the people that are in need of food assistance are a tough group. Those in the Cherry Street line looked tougher than normal. These are people that are rough around the edges; tattered and worn down from months without the certainty of a shelter or hot meal. Many are missing teeth, sport menacing tattoos, and have uncertain mental instabilities. For the most part, all of these clients mastered the art of picking two, and only two, apples from the bin. But the sly, Asian women, all of whom were under five feet and looked innocent and grandmotherly, would stealthily take three, four, even five apples from the bin. I would firmly ask them to return their stolen apples but they would smile unknowing, gap-toothed smiles and slink away. There are many ways in which appearances can be deceiving.
Northwest Harvest is unique in its firm commitment to open accesibility. No one who comes to Cherry Street is required to answer any questions. Their presence in the line is enough; they will receive food that day. To uphold this mission, Northwest Harvest cannot receive any government funding because government-funded organization are required to implement client screening. I find this model and the passionate way in which the staff and volunteers at Northwest Harvest defended to be quite surprising. At the Hunger Coalition, we never refuse anyone food, but we maintain an intimate relationship with our clients through check-ups, goals, and referrals. For Cherry Street and its 3,000 clients per day, six week check-ups and one-on-one time with clients would be impossible. Yet, I would have liked to see more data about the number, ethnic makeup, and reason for hunger of the people Cherry Street serves. From my own observations and my talks with the volunteers and staff, I would say the clients are 40% Asian, 35% Caucasian, 20% African American, 3% Middle Eastern, and 2% Native American. Many are homeless, many have serious mental disabilities, and many are addicted to drugs and alcohol. Yet, nearly every client seemed comfortable with the volunteers and the set-up of the distribution. They recognized and interacted with volunteers and thanked us repeatedly for helping. A note on volunteers: Cherry Street inspires incredible loyalty in its volunteers. I talked to one woman who has been volunteering for them every week for twenty-two years. Others, when asked if they were a long-time volunteer, would shrug and say, "Not really, I have only volunteered for five or six years." This sort of commitment astonishes me. All of them cited the efficiency, clear mission, and constant appreciation that the receive at Cherry Street as the reason for their repeated return to the site. In total, Cherry Street requires 200 volunteers a week to stay afloat, or the equivalent of twenty-five full-time employees. Currently, they have a lengthy waiting list for volunteer openings.
Around 11:30, I moved inside to spend a few hours bagging coffee. As I said above, Northwest Harvest distributes food to more than 300 food banks across Washington. They have four warehouses across the state and transfer incredible quantities of food. I spoke with Mike, the wizard of a man responsible for obtaining all of the food for Northwest Harvest. His goal is to obtain and distribute twenty million pounds of food this year. Twenty million pounds. That is a mind-blowing number. Much of the produce is donated directly from local farmers who have slightly damaged or too much produce. Mike invented a system of transferring whole truck loads of frozen goods into freezers quickly enough that the food doesn't thaw. Previously, Northwest Harvest had to deny millions of pounds of frozen goods each year because they could not transfer them off the truck and into the freezer quickly enough. Now, an entire truck can be unloaded and transferred in a fraction of the original time. Mike has hundreds of stories about the clever solutions and magical transfers he has created. When he walks through the food bank, staff and volunteers alike gaze at him with adoring eyes. The grapefruit-carrot story, recounted to me by at least three people, is legendary. A few weeks ago, Northwest Harvest had a million pound surplus of frozen carrots. The clientele in Washington overwhelmingly dislikes carrots. Mike found a grapefruit and orange distributor in Arizona who would exchange a million pounds of carrots for a million pounds of grapefruit and oranges and provide the transportation for both shipments. The ingenuity and dedication of people like Mike keep the non-profit world and the people it serves alive.
The staff at Cherry Street Food Bank was wonderfully kind. Each member, from the food bank manager to the program director, took the time to ask about my project and answer all of my questions. They also referred me to a plethora of other organizations in the Seattle area. Tomorrow morning, I will once again battle the Seattle bus system and spend the morning with Cherry Street. Next, I will head to Saint Mary's Food Bank to see what a smaller, more religious food bank looks like. For now, to bed to dream of millions of pounds of grapefruit and carrots...
Volunteers inside the warehouse working at the soup and grains table.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
The Odyssey
Here I am. It's 8:30 and I am sitting alone in the Boise airport waiting for my flight to Seattle. This may be the beginning of my Senior Project, but it is by no means the beginning of my trip. I am seven days in to a truly epic odyssey of twenty-six days, four trips across the country, seven places of accommodation, and six modes of transportation. This past week, I spent time in Stratton, VT competing for my final time at the U.S. Freestyle Championships. It was a fabulous week and a marvelous end to my career in freestyle skiing, but I have returned, exhausted, sore, and sick. This week I will be in Seattle working with Food Lifeline. The next week, I will fly to New York for a week and a half to work with Yorkville Common Pantry in Harlem. After a brief stop in Connecticut for a college orientation, I will head home for the second leg of my project.
For my Senior Project, I plan on teasing out and attempting to define the essence of hunger. I am intrigued by the dichotomy between the universal nature of hunger (we all feel it, we all understand what it means to have no food) and the millions of individual contexts that create it. I like to imagine a group of people standing in a food line. Each one is hungry, each one has, in some way, been failed by society or themselves to the point that they can no longer access the most basic of human necessities: nourishment. Yet, each one of those people, each one of those faces is unique. Each one has a story tell. Through my work with the Hunger Coalition, I have a complex understanding of the major contexts that create hungry people within our own Wood River Valley. I can identify the broad stereotypes that would characterize those in the Wood River Valley food line. However, I have almost no understanding of the contexts within which people are hungry in urban environments. I am aware of the stereotypes, but I want to look far more closely. Thus, my time in Seattle and New York will be spent learning from the people who give and receive aid about hunger outside of the valley.
For the second phase of my project, I will return to the Wood River Valley to spend two weeks recording the stories of the Hunger Coalition's clients. I would like to give them a forum in which they can tell their stories, vent their feelings, and express what they would like the rest of the valley to know and understanding. I will be compiling these stories into a "This American Life" style audio documentary that can be used for public education and as an awareness-builder for the Hunger Coalition.
The woman at the flight desk is calling "all rows, all passengers." It is time to begin my Senior Project. Let the hunger stories begin!
For my Senior Project, I plan on teasing out and attempting to define the essence of hunger. I am intrigued by the dichotomy between the universal nature of hunger (we all feel it, we all understand what it means to have no food) and the millions of individual contexts that create it. I like to imagine a group of people standing in a food line. Each one is hungry, each one has, in some way, been failed by society or themselves to the point that they can no longer access the most basic of human necessities: nourishment. Yet, each one of those people, each one of those faces is unique. Each one has a story tell. Through my work with the Hunger Coalition, I have a complex understanding of the major contexts that create hungry people within our own Wood River Valley. I can identify the broad stereotypes that would characterize those in the Wood River Valley food line. However, I have almost no understanding of the contexts within which people are hungry in urban environments. I am aware of the stereotypes, but I want to look far more closely. Thus, my time in Seattle and New York will be spent learning from the people who give and receive aid about hunger outside of the valley.
For the second phase of my project, I will return to the Wood River Valley to spend two weeks recording the stories of the Hunger Coalition's clients. I would like to give them a forum in which they can tell their stories, vent their feelings, and express what they would like the rest of the valley to know and understanding. I will be compiling these stories into a "This American Life" style audio documentary that can be used for public education and as an awareness-builder for the Hunger Coalition.
The woman at the flight desk is calling "all rows, all passengers." It is time to begin my Senior Project. Let the hunger stories begin!
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