Home - Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank



General Public Presentation Slide GuideSlide 1: Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank Hello! Thanks for having me. I am from the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank (GPCFB) and I am here today to talk to you about what we do. Let’s get started!Slide 2: Facility The Food Bank is located in Duquesne, a short way away from Kennywood amusement park. It is in a former US Steel site. The facility consists of staff offices, warehouse, and distribution center. It is a busy place with volunteers repacking food, trucks organizing deliveries and pickups, and staff working on various projects. Slide 3: Why We ExistWe exist because there are people in our community who struggle with the basic human need of having enough food to eat. 1 in 7 adults and 1 in 5 children in our region are food insecure, meaning they lack regular access to safe and nutritious food. Slide 4: Why We Exist (continued)Too many people, including seniors, working families, and folks facing unexpected circumstances are having to make tough choices between paying bills and buying food. Read statistics.Read Daniel’s quote. In the same year, the factory Daniel was working at closed down, and he was diagnosed with skin cancer. Food insecurity can affect anyone.Slide 5: Our MissionOur mission is to feed people in need and mobilize our community to end hunger. We plan to do that by increasing access to nutritious food and fostering long term stability.Slide 6: Our Commitments -Nutrition Quality We are committed to providing greater access to fresh fruits and vegetables. Currently, 32% of the food we distribute is fresh produce, but we are aiming for 50% by 2025!-Food Safety We are committed to operating a clean facility and network of agencies to keep food fresh and safe, while offering resources on food safety education and food recall notices affecting our region.-Sustainability We are aware of the impact of our operations, which is why we are committed to environmental efforts that make positive social and ethical contributions in our community. We were the first LEED certified Food Bank in the county!-Diversity, Equality and Inclusion We serve diverse community members and organizations and believe that diversity makes us stronger. We are committed to equality and inclusion and strive for a work environment where everyone feels respected, welcomed and accepted. Slide 7: Our Impact With the help of over 6,000 volunteers, we were able to distribute 35.5 million meals, including 10 million pounds of produce last fiscal year! Our bold goal is to completely meet the need in the region, which we know is about 55 million meals.Slide 8: How We Do It We distributed those 35 million meals through a number of different ways:We work with over 400 member agencies and distribution partners in an 11 county service area. These include food pantries, soup kitchens, and senior centers, which meet people where they are in their neighborhoods. We deliver food directly to those sites, and also connect them with local stores, enabling local partnerships and reducing food waste.We support a number of child nutrition programs, including school breakfasts, after school meals programs, and summer feeding sites. We also supplied over 446,000 weekend meals through our Backpack program.We distribute over 5000 boxes of food to seniors each month through a federal program called the Commodity Supplemental Food Program. Many of these boxes are delivered directly to senior living facilities. We do direct distributions through our Produce to People program. Produce to People alone provided over 3.5 million pounds of food last year. Green Grocer is a mobile farmers market truck that is designed to travel into low-access, high-need neighborhoods. Our SNAP team works hard to connect people to Nutrition Assistance by helping folks complete SNAP (formerly Food Stamps) applications.We also work with elected leaders to advocate for anti-hunger programs and policiesSlide 9: What You Can Do-DonateThe Food Bank appreciates all donations, whether that is time or money. Your donations make the work of the Food Bank possible. Every $1 can provide 5 meals!-Host a Food and Fund Drive This is a great way to increase the supply of food and resources to neighbors in need and it's very easy to get started. Let us know you are interested, promote your drive with the help of our fundraising team and online resources, host the drive, and finally get your donations to the food bank. We can also help you set up a virtual food drive so you can come together to collect funds online to reach a goal! -Attend community events The Food Bank website compiles a list of important Food Bank related events. Check that out or connect with your local food pantry to find more local events. -Advocate Join our email list to stay in the know about actions you can take to help your neighbors. Write, email, call and speak to elected officials to urge them to do their part in ending hunger. And lastly, vote for individuals who care about hunger. -Volunteer The best way to get involved as a volunteer is by completing an interest form on our website or by contacting the volunteer team via phone or email. (next slide for more volunteer info)Slide 10: VolunteersVolunteers are the heart of our operation. Volunteers give their time in a variety of ways. Repackaging pallets of food into consumer-friendly packages in the Repack Center and distributing healthy food at Produce to People events are two examples of volunteer work. Volunteers also work on farms, Gleaning, or harvesting left behind crops and offer Clerical Support, like assisting people with SNAP benefits. They also share information about the Food Bank with the community and corporations, like I am doing now.Slide 11: COVID-19 ResponseIn its 40-year history, Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank (the Food Bank) has never seen a need as large as during its current COVID-19 response. From March 18 to April 24, together with its network of 365 agencies, partners and programs spanning 11 counties of southwestern Pennsylvania, the organization provided more than 4.1 million pounds of food, enough food for more than 3.4 million meals to individuals facing food insecurity.This is a million pound increase from a typical month and includes food distributed through a variety of sources, the largest of which include:Twelve drive-up food distributions serving nearly 12,000 vehicles, accounting for nearly 600,000 pounds of food.More than 100,000 pounds to nearly 1,800 people through its emergency food assistance program at its warehouse.More than 56,000 pounds (2,250 food boxes) to 30 new partner agencies designed specifically to respond to this ongoing crisis.The Food Bank’s network of food pantries and hot meal programs provided more than 3 million pounds of food to the community.In addition to these direct food assistance methods, the Food Bank’s SNAP Team assisted 342 people with completing SNAP applications resulting in an estimated 340,000 meals (one meal equals 1.2 pounds of food), more than 1 million dollars in SNAP benefits and an economic impact of almost 1.6 million dollars to the local economy.Finally, the organization worked with school districts and community organizations to ensure children have access to approximately 25,000 Grab and Go meals while school has not been in session.In the first six weeks of the pandemic the organization had nearly 17,000 visits to its ‘Get Help’ webpage. In comparison, a typical six week span would result in about 1,100 visits to the same webpage. Additionally, we fielded more than 2,800 calls for food assistance, mostly from people who are newly unemployed.Slide 12: Questions?Thanks for being a great audience. One last thing I wanted to mention is that if you are interested in our work, please come to visit our facility. We give tours and would be thrilled to have you join one. You can contact our front desk or send an email to our team to schedule a time. Does anyone have any questions? ................
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