Dear Friends of the Food Bank,

It seems I keep talking about price inflation and higher food costs every month. This month unfortunately is no different. With budgets constrained by high prices across the board (especially energy costs) everyone is forced to make hard choices. For food bank clients, this often means choosing between nutritious and less nutritious (lower cost) foods to save money and be able to afford gasoline to drive to work.

The food bank has been addressing this problem by adding higher quality, more numerous protein rich foods to our supplemental food bags. This means our bags are bursting at the seams and require careful handling to avoid breakage. A few years ago, during the pandemic, when we began increasing the amount of food in our bags, we decided that doubling up on paper bags was the best option for packaging our food. At that time, we looked at using corrugated cardboard boxes, as many other food banks do. We found that the cost (then about $2.50 each) was prohibitive and our money was better spent on increasing the foods in our offering rather than expensive packaging.

Today we face the same dilemma; how best to balance the cost of packaging with our desire to provide maximum food to clients living in an inflationary environment. To the extent we can, we repurpose boxes we receive food in, however the cost debate, boxes versus double paper bags, is ongoing.

On September 12th, at our regular monthly supplemental food distribution our volunteers delivered 94 regular food bags and welcomed 14 new clients. We also provided 6 emergency food bags to families in September.

Our weekly Monday vegetable distribution (outside the Senior Center in Patagonia) has been week-to week, as the supply of vegetables has been dwindling as the harvest in Mexico wanes. For the near future please check in on Monday mornings, if our tables are set up at the senior center, we will be open.

On September 27, our volunteers participated in a Community Confab along with 26 other local nonprofit organizations representing arts, cultural, environmental and community service organizations. Our volunteers shared information with the public about the food bank’s mission, available services and ways to get involved.

We are looking forward to and planning for the return of our winter volunteers as well as the upcoming fall holidays.

Thank you for your support of the food bank. We are constantly reminded by the generosity of our community members what a wonderful place we are privileged to live in.

Jim