Leah's Pantry

Wednesday

Jun302010

Summer Update

Wednesday, June 30, 2010 at 01:14PM

Once again we find ourselves in a flurry of planning, hiring, and rolling out workshops in the late Spring and early Summer. By the end of June, we usually take a deep breath and enjoy hearing the news from the workshops taking place throughout the State.

This summer, we are pleased to be working at BRIDGE Housing sites as far north as Santa Rosa and Suisun City, and as far south as San Diego. Perhaps most exciting is our urban gardening workshop in West Oakland. Each workshop participant has been given a container in an urban garden to plant and care for - with all residents encouraged to get gardening! We're also working in San Mateo at Santa Inez Apartments, and we just wrapped up big projects with the San Francisco Food Bank, SHELTER Inc. of Contra Costa County, and FESCO in Hayward. We know that Kaiser has decided to continue to fund our work in CCC, so we have started to plan for those workshops set to begin in Fall 2010.

As an organization we are also spending time this year - with the help our our committed Board members (specifically our Strategic Planning Committee) to determine what course our organization should take going forward. We are set to begin our fifth year in operation - quite a milestone! - and we have so many ideas about how to broaden our impact on the health of our communities. Look for news about our upcoming Food Smarts Training Program, which we hope to get off the ground by the end of the year. We have the programming essentials in place, and are going to start fundraising this summer.

In other news, all of us in San Francisco are enjoying the local produce, bustling Farmer's Markets, and the opportunity to try new recipes and techniques. Happy summer!

Adrienne |

Announcing our 2010-2011 Board of Directors!

Tuesday, March 16, 2010 at 06:47PM

I'm pleased to announce our 2010-2011 Board of Directors:

Lisa Barnes, President (returning)

Lynn Murphy, Vice President (returning)

Brian Markworth, Treasurer (returning)

Judy Jones, M.D. (returning)

Joel Martinez

Scott Raber, J.D.

Minh Dang

Gary Young

Kris Wolcott

These individuals bring talent, dedication, and passion for our mission. We're thankful for their committment, and very much looking forward to an exciting year! Kim Freudenberg, a founding Board member, retires from the Board in May after three and a half years. Thanks Kim!!!

I'd also like to welcome Jennifer Johnson, R.D., M.P.H. onto our staff as our Nutritionist. Jennifer brings a decade of experience in the field to her work at Leah's Pantry, and we're excited to have her on board.

Adrienne |

1 Comment |

Friday

Mar122010

Closing the Food Gap

Friday, March 12, 2010 at 12:36PM

Last night a group from Leah’s Pantry attended the panel discussion hosted by Slow Food USA, called “How do we close the food gap?” Paul Ash, Executive Director of the SF Food Bank, began by saying that the food gap only exists because of the income gap, not because low-income people don’t want to eat healthy. He continued by saying that by using governmental programs, we might have a chance at closing the gap. Programs currently in place, such as Food Stamps and the Nation School Lunch Program are headed in the right direction but are underutilized or poorly executed.

There was also a lot of talk about Michelle Obama’s push to abolish food deserts, and the Obama administration’s announcement of putting $400 million toward its “Healthy Food Financing Initiative.” However, as Martin Bourque (the ED of the Ecology Center) pointed out - it is not enough to provide healthy food to people, they must also be educated. This was the most interesting part of the discussion for me and also the most relevant in regards to the work we do at Leah’s Pantry.

An audience member asked how one could teach people about eating healthy, without coming off as patronizing. Bourque agreed that this is a challenging task, and he has experienced people becoming offended when an “outsider” comes into a group, claiming to know better than them. He believes that the best way to educate a target group would be to have an insider be the teacher. People who see “organic” or “farmer’s markets” as something that is not a part of their culture, are more likely to change their minds if one of their own is promoting them. As Josh Viertel, the President of Slow Food USA, said, the most successful movements have had the most in-need groups at the center. So in the case of the food gap, the low-income population must be directly involved, as well as supported.

Nikki Henderson, the ED of People’s Grocery, concluded the discussion by taking Viertel’s idea one step farther. She believes that the food movement needs to really work out what issues need to be addressed, and how we need to address them (with the help of the government). Only then, can we start to protest outside city hall and force the government to make some real changes. Overall, I felt this discussion suggested that we are moving toward change. While hunger and obesity are at their highest, we have urban gardens popping up in low income neighborhoods, farmer’s markets’ popularity soaring, and of course, Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” initiative all moving us toward at least minimizing the gap. There is hope!

Emily |

1 Comment |

Monday

Mar082010

We're hiring!

Monday, March 8, 2010 at 07:51PM

Stay tuned for more job postings and volunteer opportunities. We're currently looking for a facilitator to work in Antioch at a transitional homeless shelter. We also have four sites in San Francisco - in three languages (Chinese, Spanish, and English) that we're running in partnership with the San Francisco Food Bank. We'll be staffing one paid facilitator with a volunteer on each site, so if you're interested in getting into the nutrition field, this is a great opportunity! All of our opportunities will be posted on Craigs List (paid) and Volunteer Match (volunteer.)

For more details, please read our job descriptions and submit an online application.

For those of you in San Francisco, be sure to pick up a copy of this month's common ground. Their focus is on nutrition, and they did an exemplary job of bringing to light some of the emerging issues with genetically modified food. A compelling read, to say the least.

And last, but not least, a great big giant thank you to Rainbow Grocery Cooperative. Their generous grant to Leah's Pantry will enable us to run programming at Clara House (part of Compass Community Services) as well as launch our new partnership initiative, aimed at training the staff or organizations around the state.

Adrienne |

Shop at Whole Foods 1/18 - 4/11!

Thursday, January 14, 2010 at 12:41PM

I received some VERY exciting news today! Whole Foods Market on Franklin in San Francisco has chosen Leah's Pantry to be a part of its bag donation program for the upcoming quarter, which runs January 18 - April 11. Shoppers who bring their own bag can choose one of three organizations to support! We applied specifically to fund another round of workshops at Clara House for 2010. Although we won't know the size of the donation until the culmination of the program, I'm going to be bugging everyone I know to shop at Whole Foods and tell their friends to shop there too! In addition to the money raised, it's obviously fantastic to have such public exposure for our organization. Thank SO MUCH to Whole Foods, and thanks in advance to all of you for spreading the word.

Adrienne |