Helping to Feed the Hungry in Essex County

The Essex County Hunger Relief Project

As the severity of the economic crisis became apparent in late 2008, the ECCF Board of Trustees met to explore a special response to help those most affected in the County.  They challenged the staff to support local food pantries and soup kitchens to ensure that no one went hungry in Essex County.  Since early 2009 we have been meeting with directors of hunger organizations to learn their needs and to define a set of goals through this collaboration. Two projects emerged:

The Website
In early October 2009, we launched the Essex County Hunger Relief website! This website is designed so that people can locate local food pantries and soup kitchens, clients can find food programs that serve their town, volunteers can find where to serve, donors can learn what is needed most and the food organizations themselves can use the private forum to post resources and discuss ideas.

Every year in early May the U.S. Letter Carriers Union sponsors a nationwide food drive. Residents from participating towns put bags of food out by their mail box and the postal workers pick them up and deliver them to area distribution sites for sorting and picking up by local food pantries. Last spring the local branch of the Letter Carriers Union approached ECCF about providing bags for them to deliver to residents a few days before the drive. These bags would remind people to put out food on the day of the drive and have proved very successful when in other parts of the country.

Having recently launched the Essex County Hunger Relief Project with support from the Nordstrom Company and The Women’s Fund of Essex County, this seemed like an ideal first project.  ECCF joined with Project Bread to produce 250,000 plastic bags for the Food Drive. In participating communities, red and white bags were delivered to residents and resulted in a dramatic increase in donations.  In Gloucester, where the delivery of bags was coordinated with newspaper coverage, there was an 80% increase over last year in the amount of food donated!

Next year, The U.S. Letter Carrier’s Food Drive will take place on Saturday, May 8th, 2010.  The Essex County Hunger Relief Project plans again to support the U.S. Letter Carriers in their efforts in this essential community service.