Blaine County Hunger Coalition

The following represents a reporting of accomplishments achieved from july 1, 2022 to june, 30 2023. The impacts of the housing crisis and high inflation, coupled with the lingering effects of covid-19 brought with it unprecedented need in Blaine County, which continued into this fiscal year with unexpected increases. Over 6,000 people were served through our various programs in that timeframe. Growing food security volunteer for veggies (v4v): participants trade hours of labor on bloom community farm and in the hope garden for shares of fresh produce. This year the hope garden had the largest, most consistent turnout. With additional staff support from our farm assistants and byp leadership interns, we were equipped to not only manage but also have more meaningful engagements with volunteers. Our v4v volunteers logged over 800 hours the greenhouses contributed to these engagement opportunities, extending our volunteer season into the winter months. Education in the garden: this season we continued to host groups from local schools and summer camps. Our partnerships this season were a continuation of the relationships we have previously built. This year, we hosted 15 different groups totaling over 180 kids in our growing spaces. Bloom youth project (byp): byp offers tools and opportunities to support youth in becoming healthy, thriving adults. We help teens develop skills to achieve their goals and reduce their vulnerability to food insecurity. Interns work hard to boost food production at our three growing sites, provide food to low income neighborhoods through our discounted mobile markets, staff the bloom truck for our summer food program, and assist in running our weekly food distributions. In their second year as interns, these teens gain more independence, responsibility and leadership throughout the organization as they move into their leadership tracks. This year 5 teens completed their 18-month internship. During the reporting period, byp interns engaged with 20 community partners through a series of life skills workshops, and completed over 400 customer interactions through the mobile market. Food production: our harvest ends up on the plates of our food insecure neighbors through the programs described above or in our food pantry and children's food programs. Nearly 3,400 pounds of produce were grown in our garden and at our new greenhouses during the reporting period. We were able to engage more volunteers this year thanks to the greenhouses. Advocacy & outreach: with bloom community food center, we've built a place where people want to be, not somewhere people feel they have to be. It's a move from charity to solidarity. In our new commercial kitchen, we utilized 472 hours of volunteer time to serve over 6,600 community meals to families at our weekly food distributions. The advocacy team went above and beyond during the winter of 2022 when people were found to be living in the elements. With the collaboration of other organizations, an emergency shelter was constructed, which housed 99 adults and 59 children from dec 2022 through mar 2023. The advocacy team partnered with 20 partner organizations to reach out to the community to continue identifying root causes of Hunger.

3. Healthy food pantry our healthy food pantry consists of a comprehensive food recovery, warehousing, distribution and support system to efficiently provide access to nutritious, supplementary foods and care for families in crisis. Post- pandemic, we saw a continued increase in service numbers from unexpected lingering effects of the pandemic. Lack of affordable housing combined with skyrocketing inflation pushed local families already reeling from the pandemic over the edge. We provided over 18,250 grocery carts to nearly 4,000 deserving people during the reporting period, a significant increase over the previous period. Thanks to our food recovery efforts, over 150,000 pounds of food were donated to our food pantry. Altogether, we distributed over 605,000 pounds of fresh and non-perishable foods through the food pantry in the reporting period utilizing over 3,400 volunteer hours. Towards the end of the reporting period, our service numbers shot up from 350 families served each week on average to nearly 450 families due to an influx of service industry workers moving to our County. As businesses rebound from the pandemic, a hiring frenzy ensued. Unfortunately, these new families encountered a housing shortage combined with high cost of living which brought them to our doors. We were fortunate to be able to respond to this influx due to our generous donor and volunteer community.

2. Children's food programs bloom truck: bloom truck is a mobile lunch and library in partnership with the community library that provides free food, fun, and reading for children in isolated pockets of Blaine County. With seven different mobile locations over an 11-week period, we served over 4,500 healthy lunches to 251 children from carey to ketchum. We also collaborated with 12 partner organizations who provided 44 free enrichment activities to the kids. 23 volunteers dedicated 174 hours in the kitchen to help make this program run by chopping and bagging over 2,200 pounds of food. Snack pack program: our backpack program, which we call snack packs, effectively provides essential nutrition over the weekends and after school for school age children. We provided 4,057 snack packs during the school year to keep kids fed and ready to learn. Over 140 children were sent home from school each week with nutritious meals they could make themselves. Daily bites: through daily bites, we provide supplemental nutritious food to schools, after school programs, and summer camps. During the reporting period, we distributed nearly 4,500 healthy snacks and food items each week to keep children fed, active and engaged. We also stock three school pantries at middle and upper schools to provide stigma-free food options for older students who are often reluctant to participate in traditional backpack programs. With nine school locations and 12 after-school locations, we estimate serving over 1,700 children through this program. Infant formula initiative: providing essential nutrition for babies during the first year of their life is key to the building blocks of childhood. Through the generosity of our community, we were able to ensure 100% of the mothers who reached out to us had access to the nutrition their babies need.

We recently completed a new strategic plan which outlines two key areas for impact: good food access and root causes. We are deploying board-designated assets in order to maximize the long-term impacts for our community. To address immediate needs, we will continue core programs through 2025. In order to achieve our vision of a Hunger free Blaine County, we are strategically addressing root cause issues. We know addressing complex problems like food insecurity is a massive undertaking and we can't do it alone. We need to combine areas of expertise to be most effective. Our efforts through 2025 will be dedicated to exploring deeper partnerships that affect greater, systemic change. This furthers our transition from charity to solidarity, in collaboration with key partners. Through this work, we prioritize the entire community over our individual organization, foster a sense of belonging and interdependence, present our work not as individual transactions but holistically, and encourage mutual support between nonprofits.