No Child Goes Hungry (NCGH) is pleased to provide a $1,000 donation to the Flagstaff Family Food Center (FFFC). The Flagstaff, Arizona-based hunger-relief organization serves hot meals, provides children’s literacy programs, and distributes emergency food boxes to food-insecure members of its community 365 days a year. NCGH’s donation will help support FFFC’s efforts to expand its mobile food delivery truck service, which serves vulnerable children and families in Leupp, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation.
FFFC provides the most extensive and wide-reaching emergency food support in Northern Arizona. Through its multiple hunger relief programs, it serves approximately 1,500 people per day with over 47,000 meals and over 25,000 food boxes delivered to Flagstaff families annually, including 10,000 children per year.
The need for our services has continued to grow, and the COVID-19 pandemic intensified this need for many families, resulting in hundreds of people turning to our food bank for the first time,” said Carrie Henderson, FFFC Development Director. “COVID-19 and its ongoing economic impacts have been challenging for our most vulnerable community members. These include families struggling to make ends meet with children no longer receiving free or reduced-price lunch at school and our neighbors on the Navajo Nation who are seeing the highest levels of coronavirus nationwide. On average, our food assistance programs have increased by 80 percent since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis. We expect the need to remain high as our neighbors work hard to get back on their feet after having their hours cut or jobs lost, while others are likely to remain unemployed or underemployed for months to come.”
According to Henderson, as FFFC sought new ways to provide food to those who need, it discovered that mobile pantries are an effective model for reaching new individuals and families in need of food assistance. One such group includes working parents who cannot access its Emergency Food Box Distribution program during work hours.
For NCGH, its grant distribution to FFFC marks its ninety-first grant in four years and the twenty-first state in which it has provided funding since its inception.
“We are inspired by the work of FFFC to support the most vulnerable populations in its community and amplify its efforts during the continued COVID-19 crisis,” said Kären Rasmussen, Founder and Director of NCGH. “We are pleased to support its mobile pantry distribution program and hope other organizations are inspired by FFFC’s innovative approach to closing the gap between those in need and available resources.”
To learn how NCGH can help support your local hunger advocacy initiative, contact us today.