Kidney Beans and Biking

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 5


Tomorrow, August 14th, is the Biking for Backpacks rally to raise money to fill  backpacks with  food  to distribute on weekends to  needy children during the upcoming school year. Out first project today was to assemble the "goodie bag" for the participants.   We assembled 50 bags and the hope is that more folks show up to ride. 

After that, we worked on labeling and re-packing over 2000 cans of red kidney beans!  A very productive day!

Finished Product...repacked cases if kidney beans ready for re-distribution to the food pantries!

Biking for Backpacks

Local Food Bank Seeks Donations
By Vanessa Grieve (vgrieve@journalnet.com)  
     POCATELLO — The shelves in the Idaho Foodbank warehouse are an indication that the usual September lull in food donation has arrived a month early.
   Joye Jones, branch manager for the Eastern Idaho Foodbank, said some food remains, but selection is limited.
   “We have food, just not a lot of variety,” Jones said. “This is typically a slow season. It hit earlier this year.”
   The Idaho Foodbank normally relies on third parties for food donations, said Jones.  
   With the need having gone up 40 percent in the last quarter, Jones said some of the increased demand has resulted from the poor economy and peoples’ unemployment benefits running out.
   For a fifth year, the Idaho Foodbank will also offer its backpack program, which provides backpacks containing a weekend’s worth of food to schoolchildren at risk of going without adequate nutrition.
   This year’s event, called Biking for Backpacks, will be held Aug.14. The event will   start and end at the Idaho Foodbank Warehouse, 555 S. First Ave., beginning at 9 a.m.
   Participants can ride to provide food-filled backpacks to hungry schoolchildren this fall.
   Jones said the program averages filling 600 backpacks a week during the school year.
   The Foodbank hopes to raise $1,500 through the event to fund the backpacks, which cost about $6.20 each to fill.
   There will be two bike routes for bicyclists to chose   from. The long ride is 26 miles to Inkom with an adult registration fee of $35. A shorter ride is 13 miles to Fort Hall Mine Road by Century High School with an adult entrance fee of $25. Fees for children ages 10-17 are $10 for either ride. Children under the age of 10arefree.Registrationwillgo until the morning of Aug. 14.
   A barbecue, open to the public, will be held at noon at the Foodbank after the biking event. Prices for adults are $5, and children are $2. The barbecue is included in the entrance fee.
   For more information on the backpack program or to register for the bike rides, go to  www.bikingforbackpacks.org

Back to School

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 2

In a few short weeks school  we be starting as will the Idaho food bank backpack program. Each Friday, backpacks  containing a weekend’s worth of food  are handed out to schoolchildren at risk of going without adequate nutrition. 

177 new backpacks donated by GateCity Rotory

They will be filled and handed out to children in need.

Last spring voluteers packed hundreds of plastic sacks containing a weekends worth of food. They were placed in large totes and stored for the summer.

Totes full of sacks for the backpacks

Unfortunaely, before the sacks can be placed in backpacks and  handed out to children, all the totes (containing thousands of sacks) must be gone through. Some of the food has spoiled over the summer. That is what we worked on last week...emptying the totes and throwing out the sacks with spoiled food. We went thru four totes (over 500 sacks) and found about a dozen sacks of bad food.   That was the good news!

 "Good" sacks

The bad news is that there was any spoiled food at all.

A wedding Present

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 2
Accomplished: Getting thank notes ready to mail, Re-packing cereal

Today Mary,  a young woman, came in  to donate the money and food she and her new husband,  had at thier request,  received for their June 12th wedding. It is always heart warming to hear about such selflessness! An amazing couple!

Joye (director of the foodbank) and Mary

Today we spent the first  hour folding letters and stuffing envelops containing  thank you notes for foodbank donors.  Then we went and helped two other volunteers repacking bulk cereal for the food pantries. The cereal was scooped  into labeled plastic bags,  sealed and packed 12 to a box. The four of us  managed to complete re-packing the remains of giant bulk container. Yeah!

 Packing cereal

 Thank you notes , stamped and ready to go!

A new Pantry Opening in Idaho Falls

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 2
Accomplished: Repacking
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week:  Executive Director Roy Lacey said the donation of 3,138 pounds of prime beef delivered through the Beef Counts program will help feed more than 8,000 people in Southeast Idaho.  Foodbank loads up on beef (see complete article in this link)

There's a new food pantry opening up tomorrow in Idaho Falls at the Hispanic Foursquare Church. They've set aside a room in their church, built shelves, established a partnership with the food bank, advertised and are ready to go. According to Joye, the director of the foodbank here in Eastern Idaho, this pantry is located in an area  of IF that has been under served by the foodbank...she's hopeful that it will a blessing to those in the area who are in  need.  A group of the folks from this church came down to Pocatello to the foodbank pick up food. A combination of fresh, frozen and dry goods were loaded onto their pickup with help from the Foodbank employees. The spokesperson told me that the food would be available to anyone who wanted it.

Food for the new pantry

Today we "repacked", sorting the donations that come into the foodbank via food drives, into boxes that get labeled and shipped to pantries like the one opening in Idaho Falls

As the food comes in, it is dumped into these huge cardboard containers.

You can  see here the variety of canned goods. Today as we sorted we had to keep watch for spaghettios...there was a recent recall on them. It broke my heart seeing these cans of food going into the garbage as I thought about all the hungry children I had seen in Africa the past few weeks.

Posted in the wall are the categories we use to sort.

The boxes are weighed and labeled and put on pallets for distribution to the partner agencies.

29,400 Pounds of Food - Behind the Scenes

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: Accomplished: Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week:

A few weeks ago , (see post May 7,2010) we spent most of our time making up boxes for the impending Postal Workers Food Drives . The Journal reported the result on May 22. Here's the report. It's nice to know that our efforts helped facilitate this successful drive!

Making up Boxes for the Postal Workers Food Drive

POSTAL WORKERS DRIVE COLLECTS 29,400 POUNDS OF FOOD FOR LOCAL GROUPS POCATELLO — On May 8, the postal workers put on their annual food drive.   Food was picked up all over the Pocatello and taken to the Idaho Foodbank on South First Avenue, where it was sorted, boxed, and placed on pallets.
   Fourteen pallets were filled and more than 29,400 pounds of food were collected.
   This food was distributed among organizations such as The Salvation Army, Southeast Idaho Community Action Agency, Aid for Friends, and St. Vincent de Paul.
   Food that was collected goes toward feeding those in need through soup kitchens, food boxes, and food for the shelter.
   Much appreciation to those that donated food to these organizations, who are working to stamp out hunger in the area. 

Another successful GAP Friday!

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 2
Accomplished: Friday GAP delivery weighed, sorted and boxed 
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week: The foodbank was recently  awarded  a 4 star rating from  Charity Navigator, America's premier charity evaluator, for sound fiscal management.  Forbes, Business Week, and Kiplinger's Financial Magazine, among others, have profiled and celebrated  their unique method of applying data-driven analysis to the charitable sector. Only 25% of the organizations they evaluate get this rating!  See more about the announcement here...

This is an example of some  bakery  items delivered to the foodbank via the GAP program. (see Post dated May 16, 2010). It looks good, for the most part. What isn't, we  discard. Today we spent our time sorting and boxing donated deliveries from the local grocery stores. 

This is some folks from the Fort Hall Assembly of God Church loading up to stock their pantry. They operate a pantry which is open one Saturday a month. They are also open whenever they have church services, Today they picked up boxes of canned goods as well some fresh and frozen items.

A year ago this would have been going into a dumpster....

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 1
Accomplished: Sorting and re-packing GAP deliveries
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week:The following cities are serviced by th Foodbank's Pocatello Warehouse: Aberdeen, American Falls, Arco, Blackfoot, Challis, Chubbuck, Downey , Driggs, IdahoFalls, Lemhi, Mackay, Oneida, Pocatello, Preston, Ririe, Roberts, Salmon, Shelley, Soda Springs, St. Anthony

Boxes and Crates of Food From Grocery Stores
As we weighed, sorted and re-packed the truck load of fresh meat, eggs, dairy, eggs, produce and bakery goods, the food looked amazing. Items included chicken, top quality steaks, hamburger, sausage, organic milk, name brand yogurt, orange juice, cauliflower, mushrooms, peppers (not just green but red, yellow and orange), as well as countless bread, rolls, cakes, doughnuts and other assorted bakery items. All of which I would personally use and serve my family. A year ago this would have been destined for the dumpster. But thanks to GAP,the Grocery Alliance Program, implemented by the Idaho Foodbank in the last year, this food was on the way to local pantries and food distribution centers throughout southeast Idaho.

The Gap program, was recently described in the January newsletter published by the Foodbank. "Gap is a partnership that currently includes the Foodbank, Albertsons, Walmart, and Costco. As food approaches its sell-by date, the stores' managers designate what they want to donate, and the Foodbank picks it up. This keeps the store from having to pay disposal costs, and the Foodbank provides each store with a donation receipt that can be used for tax purposes. Most importantly, the food goes to hungry Idaho families. This is high-quality nutritious food, and the Foodbank distributes it to its partner agencies within 48 hours of receiving it to ensure its quality remains high . Fresh, perishable food is in high demand, especially high-protein items such as meat. These generous donations enable the  Foodbank to provide more well-rounded and healthy choices to hungry Idaho families
 
The GAP deliveries are made to the food bank every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and must be quickly processed. All the food is weighed by store so they can get the tax credit. Then it is repackaged for distribution to the partner agencies. Meats first, which are quickly taken to the freezer. Then dairy and eggs, which is placed in dairy crates and carted off to the refrigerator. Next comes the fruits and vegetables, also packaged and refrigerated. Lastly bakery goods are packages and then frozen to keep as fresh as possible.

 Re- packing GAP donations

The Community Breakfast

Number of Folks Helping Out Today: 4
Accomplished: Lots of Boxes Taped, 1 pallet (45 boxes)  of bread packaged, Meat, Dairy, Eggs, Produce packages
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week: The Pocatello Food Bank serves 52 Partner Agencies throughout Southeastern Idaho

Idaho Food Bank Partner Agency - First United Methodist Church

On the 2nd & last Sunday of each month, from  7:30am-10:00am, the First United Methodist Church holds a community breakfast. All are invited. They even send a van around to pick up folks who want to attend but don't have transportation to get there. Today, while we were working, two ladies came to pick up food for the breakfast: eggs, milk, juice, bread, bacon and today three flats of strawberries!  The ladies said others in the church cook up a few breakfast casseroles, serve it with bacon or sausage, juice, milk, coffee and various breads and donuts and pastries.  They supplement what the food bank can't provide.  This is just one example of where the food from the food bank goes.

Strawberries!

 













Bread & Pastries.

Postal Service Food Drive  
Tomorrow, the Postal Service is sponsoring a food drive.  The food they pickup will  be delivered to the food bank. sorted an packaged and then delivered to the partner agencies. The food bank, while not a recipient of the donated food, none the less is lending a hand to coordinate the effort, providing it's facility, know how and resources.  Our group helped out by taping hundreds of boxes in preparation for the food coming in tomorrow.


  Boxes stacked up ready for food drive











Packing Bread!

Whoops! That's a lot of bowties!

Number of Folks: 2 + Lots of folks from the home school group
Accomplished: 300 dental kits, over 1500 lbs of pasta packaged!
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week: The food bank partners with 52 agencies in South East Idaho.  (i.e. distributes the food they get to this agencies who in turn distribute it to families and  others in need.)

Although only 2 folks showed up from our small group today, there was plenty of workers. Many different groups help out at the food bank and today,  a large group of kids and adults  from the Christian Home School Association showed up.  They come once a quarter to help out at the food bank.  At least one of the  families attends Grace. What an interesting and enthusiastic bunch!  We worked on 3 different projects: bread, dental kits and bow tie pasta.

Dental Kits
A group of kids was put on the dental kits which were packed assembly line style:  2 large tooth brushes, a tube of tooth paste and three small tooth brushes in  a small sack.  The items were donated by a local dental group. The kits will go into back packs distributed by the "Back Pack Program".

The kids did a great job assembling the dental kits.

     

Finished kits.

Bow Tie Pasta

Heinz recently donated 25,000 lbs of  bowtie pasta to the food bank that had been mistakenly frozen. They were afraid the pasta would not fare well in the manufacturing process. Their "mistake" was a bonanza for the food bank. The pasta came in 25 pound cartons that needed to be broken down into 1 pound packages for distribution to the partner agencies.   We labeled bags, scooped pasta into them, tied them off and re-packed them into their original cartons.  We managed to re-package over 1500 lbs in the two hours we were there!  But there's still a lot of pasta to re-package!

I love this picture of the kids labeling bags! It shows that even the youngest kids can help!

25 pounds of loose bowtie pasta..

Scooping the pasta into bags.

One pound bags.

1145 pounds of pasta ready to distribute to the food pantries through out Eastern IDaho!

Spaghetti

Number of Folks: 3
Accomplished: packaged 312 1 pound packages of spaghetti
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week: Only 36% of the Idaho food bank recipients also get food stamp.

Every year, in conjunction with Feeding the 5000 Families Campaign,  the LDS cannery in  Idaho falls donates the output of their facility for an evening to the Idaho Food Bank. The only caveat:we have to provide the volunteers.  This year we canned 172 cases of spaghetti sauce and the Cannery donated and delivered to the food bank a d additional 128 cases each of vegetable, tomato and chicken noodle soup and 75 cases  of bulk spaghetti.

Our project today was re-packaging the spaghetti into one pound packages.  W got thru 13 cases.

Each case contains 3 8 lb packages of spaghetti. We labeled bags, put in about 1 lb of spaghetti, sealed the bag and put it back into the box. 



Here's a picture of the volunteers working in the cannery making spaghetti sauce.

Bulk spaghetti delivered from Cannery,

3 of these 8 lb packages  are in each box.

Packaging the spaghetti...into 1 lb containers.








The 13 repacked cases.

Backpack Program Part II

Number of Folks: 5
Accomplished:  440 sacks assembled to put in the backpacks
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week:

VOLUNTEERS ARE CRUCIAL to the Success of Food Distribution
96% of pantries
91% of kitchens
69% of shelters

Depend on Volunteers

 

The Foodbank tries to assemble enough  sacks of food for the backpack program  to last for half the school year.  But the need continues to be great, so this week there were more sacks to assemble. Palettes  of single serving cans beef stew, lasagne and spaghetti-o's, cups of applesauce and mixed fruit, a tube of peanut butter, 6 oz. juice boxes, microwave cups of mac& cheese, 1 quart of milk (in an aseptic package) and fruit bars were all lined up.   In assembly line fashion we filled the sacks, tied them off, counted them and placed them in a big box. Random folks came in and helped; Dave walked in off the street and asked to help, taking a spot in our assemble line,  a six grade boy who attended  Irving (why wasn't he in school?) whose help consisted of using  the clicker to count each filled sack in between playing games on his cell phone,  and a third  gentleman who opened the cases of milk and stacked them up for us. At 3, we were relieved by a bunch of guys from an ISU fraternity.

Our Crew

 

Start of the Line

                   End of the Line

Spices

Number of Folks: 2 
Accomplished:  Make up 5 boxes containing 36 packages each of spaghetti sauce spice.  
Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week:

Last Year the Backpack Program increased 43%
1,100 per week in 2008
1,580 per week in 2009
The need is 7,000 backpacks per week

This weeks project was labeling small zip lock bags and filling them with a spice mixture used to cook spaghetti sauce. The spice is donated in bulk to the food bank.

Meat

Number of Folks: 6
Accomplished: Packed  and sorted  between 2-3 thousands pounds of meat, dairy, eggs, produce and baked goods.

Idaho Hunger Fact of the Week: 41% of food bank recipients’ households included children under age 18.

Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday area grocery stores deliver to the food bank,  goods near their expiration date. This food must be weighed, logged, sorted and either frozen, refrigerated  or shipped out to the agencies and  community pantries quickly. The weighing and logging are important because the stores get tax write-offs for the food that is donated.  Here's the process:

Meats are done first because they need to be put into the freezer as soon as possible. Meat is weighed by store, pounds noted on a spread sheet, and then put on a conveyor to be packed into boxes and marked.  Yesterday chicken, beef, pork, sausage, lunch meats, bacon, ham and other miscellaneous products.  It was really heartening to see so much product as well as variety!

Next we did dairy and eggs. Same process, but it is put into plastic dairy crates you often see at the stores.  Products included milk, juice,  yogurt, in short anything you'd find in the dairy care.  Not much dairy yesterday...maybe a dozen crates.

Produce was next. We had to sort thru and throw out anything rotten. The rule was, "would you eat or use this yourself?".  It' very subjective because each of us have different standard.   Wish folks could just go to the stores and make the decision themselves. You might have a different standard if you or your kids needed food!

Next was baked goods...bread, muffins, doughnuts, cakes, cookies, cakes --- anything you'd find in the bakery/bread section of a grocery store. A lot of it looked great! Made us hungry.

Last was miscellaneous frozen foods(products you'd find in the freezer)...not much of that!

As usual, time went quickly and we finished our work in about an hour and a half.  Another successful week.

Bread or God Provides the number of workers needed

Number of Folks: 3
Accomplished: Packed 72 Cases of Bread + Unkown # of  Dairy, Fresh Produce and  Baked Goods Delivered from area Grocery stores

"Time goes fast when we are here", we agreed.  Although just 3 of us showed up today, it was exactly the right number of people.  Out first  assignment was packing bread.  Relatively easy after the frenetic pace and heavy lifting we did last week. The process, tape up the boxes, pack six loaves of bread into a box, tape the box shut. mark it with an "L" and stack on a pallet.

                                                                               Marking the Boxes..

Packing Bread





               Done and ready to be shipped out!

After we we finished the bread, we went to help pack and sort fresh produce, dairy, baked good and meat. Each Monday, Wednesday and Friday area grocery stores deliver to the food bank goods that are near their expiration date. This food must be sorted and shipped out to the agencies and pantry's quickly. Some of the stuff is frozen.  A group from the alternative school that comes each week on Friday's was already working on this project. These young teens come with their "work coaches" to help learn work skills. They were friendly and hard working.  Seems like a lot of people win... the kids, the foodbank and ultimately the folks needing food!   Another good week.

Sorting and Boxing Food

Number of Folks:11
Accomplished: Sorting and boxing between 5 and 6 tons of food.

Today, 11 folks showed up from Grace to volunteer!  We were assigned the job of sorting food. As food (cans, jars, boxes, bags, etc.)  come into the foodbank it is collected in large boxes.  This jumble of food needs to be sorted and boxed for distribution to the agencies.  The folks  at the foodbank has established the  following categories: vegetables, fruits, meat, beverages, cereals, grains, snacks, condiments, baby items, household items.  The food is sorted into boxes, weighed, taped shut, labeled and stacked onto pallets. With so many people, we needed someone just taping empty boxes because we were filling them so fast.

The  trickiest part is often deciding what category the item belongs to. Sometimes it's not obvious. For example, spaghetti sauce is a condiment. So is peanut butter, pancake syrup, spices, cooking oil and  packaged sauce mixes.  Chili with meat (con carne) is a meat. Chili with beans is a vegetable. Snacks include all dessert items such as pie fillings, cake mixes, jello and muffin mixes.  You have to open all the peanut butter jars because people often donate jars that have been opened. We found several.("Yuck!") Badly dented cans and any package that has been opened has to be thrown out.  If a cereal box is opened, but the package inside is  still sealed, it's OK. Once you learn the system, it's just work. The foodbank was very happy and I think a little surprised  with how much we accomplished in a couple of hours! They thanked us profusely!

One thing that struck me is how much junk, I mean snack, food is donated. Cookies, chips, crackers and candy were probably half of the volume of food  (at least this day).  I suppose it keeps people from being hungry, but surely not healthy!