GRANTEES - THIRD ROUND

Sister Carmen Community Center

SCCC’s food bank has been in operation for over 40 years, but they are now seeing an unprecedented number of participants—double normal this time of year. They serve disproportionately impacted populations including children (25% of our participants are children), older adults, LGBTQ, those with disabilities, and the homeless. A large portion of the population are those who would not qualify for benefits (unemployment, SNAP, stimulus checks) such as immigrants, low-income, wage/gig workers, contractors, day laborers, or domestic workers.

White Horse Creek Council

This funding will provide immediate food access to the vulnerable people of the community. The White Horse Creek Council non-profit has been asked to buy, prepare, and deliver buffalo to as many people as possible in the community and surrounding area, where people cannot get food because it is unavailable or too expensive.

Emergency Family Assistance Association

EFAA addresses hunger, poverty and homelessness in Boulder through our Food Pantry, wraparound basic needs supports and housing for homeless families.

Community Food Share

Food procurement is an ongoing urgent need and concern as increasing numbers of people lose their incomes and are at risk of food insecurity. Overall, Community Food Share distributed 1.1 million pounds of food in March, a 48% increase compared to March 2019. At the same time, donations of food are at an all-time low, which means they need additional funds to purchase an unprecedented amount of food.

Boulder County AIDS Project

Since 1985, BCAP has been working to improve the lives of people living with HIV (PLHIV), reduce transmission, and end stigma. With offices in Boulder and Longmont, BCAP provides HIV Care Services and Prevention Services to support, advocate, and educate the public. BCAP reaches more than 14,000 people annually.

HIV Care Services ensure people living with HIV have access to specialized case management services, medical care and insurance coverage, and basic needs assistance, including food and hygiene items, that support engagement in care and individual wellness. Funding will assist BCAP’s effort to reduce hunger among low income PLHIV.

Safehouse Progressive Alliance for Nonviolence

SPAN’s Emergency Shelter for survivors of domestic violence and their children is a 27-bed facility that provides primarily very low income women and children with safe shelter and basic needs, including three meals a day. Since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, 12 women and 14 children have found safe haven at SPAN’s Shelter; this includes two families, one with four children and the other with six. Both families had been compelled to leave other shelters that closed due to COVID.

SPAN is also supporting individuals and families who cannot access SPAN’s Shelter, either because the facility is full or in one particularly important case, because the family of five is in quarantine due to COVID-19 symptoms. SPAN is providing these people with hotel rooms and meals, as well as much-needed emotional support and resource navigation.
Many of SPAN’s Transitional Services Program clients have been financially impacted, losing their livelihoods, often the type of contract or “gig” employment that makes them ineligible for immediate relief. Many of these clients are also at-risk and reluctant to leave their homes due to pre-existing health concerns, immigration issues and a lack of transportation.

Since mid-March the Kitchen Manager at SPAN’s Emergency Shelter has packed as many as 15 emergency food boxes a week for these vulnerable individuals and their families. Food boxes are delivered by program staff to clients’ homes or other safe locations. Funding from Blueprint to End Hunger would help provide at least 60 emergency food boxes to low income survivors of violence and their families through May.

Overall, SPAN’s Shelter Program is providing more food to a greater number of Shelter residents and other clients, as schools and businesses closed and “shelter in place” orders were imposed. Blueprint to End Hunger funding will support providing 4,500 meals to Shelter residents and other SPAN clients, staff and volunteers over the course of the next eight weeks. These unbudgeted and unprecedented expenditures for food and meal service are costing SPAN approximately $5,000 per week in product, cleaning/sanitizing, and staff time.

Community Services of Broomfield dba Broomfield FISH

FISH is in need of emergency funding to prevent hunger and promote food security in their community. COVID-19 has been devastating to their low-income residents--particularly hourly wage workers, immigrants, refugees, seniors on fixed incomes, and those with disabilities--who are disproportionately impacted by the health and economic effects of this virus. In March, the number of families coming for food doubled.

The Refuge

The Refuge Cafe is the only place in Broomfield where people can get free lunch, coffee, personal care items, supplemental food, advocacy, and a safe (and warm) place to rest with no barriers. They transitioned first to the Outdoor Cafe (for 3 weeks in March) to the Outreach Cafe (on our third week this week). These transitions are all centered on ensuring the the most vulnerable in the community receive the food and essential items they need. Their work is primarily centered on people who fall through every other crack---are not on proper social services, do not have access to internet or phones, people who are unhoused, either living in cars or outside and now part of a hotel voucher program that we catalyzed with our community partners, people with significant mental and physical disabilities, and individuals who are in the most at-risk categories with no safety net and not part of existing programs.Growing Home Inc.Growing Home provides basic needs supports (food bank, housing stability assistance, case management), programs for parents to encourage healthy child development, and community organizing/advocacy to address systemic issues that keep families in poverty.

Commun

Commún builds community resilience through relationships and programs that center community voice, cultivate a sense of belonging, and realize equity. During this unpresedented time, Commún provides 12,000+ lbs of free food in drive-through and delivery boxes to over 700 community members in Southwest Denver per week.

Food for Thought Denver

Food for Thought – Denver strives to eliminate weekend hunger for children in the Denver area by providing food Powersacks. Doing so allows them to contribute more positively to their school environment and the communities in which they live, regardless of economic and social class. We believe that no child should go hungry.

Denver Dream Center

Denver Dream Center works closely with Denver Housing Authority, Denver Police Dept, and the EOC to address growing needs in high risk / low income communities. There are daily deliveries of food and resources to those in need and every Thursday a mass delivery of food as well as specific locations where people can come get hot meals.

SouthWest Improvement Council

Founded in 1988, SWIC had been doing a food bank every week for many years up until 2018. Due to limited support for the food bank, service was reduced from every week to every other week. The number of individuals/families served (amount of food distributed is proportion to family size) every other Tuesday has averaged approximately 35 individuals/families. With the advent of the COVID 19 pandemic, both the SWIC Food Bank and its week day congregate meals changed from on site, customer service to both drive by, handout of food bags and delivery services. Demand for biweekly food bank service since the beginning of March has grown to more than 50 individuals/families.

Front Line Farming

We anticipate up to 30% of Denver residents becoming food insecure in the next six to nine months. It is also known that SNAP applications have increased by approximately 90% in the city and county of Denver in the span of one month. It is necessary to make sure that Frontline Farming's food reaches the people that have the least power, who experience a variety of adverse effects of marginalization within the food system. Frontline Farming recognizes the necessity of expanding our Healing Foods Program to ensure their food finds the people who need it most.

Colective Creando Cambios en Colorado/Colorado Changemakers Collective

The Colectiva Creando Cambios en Colorado was created in 2018 with a long-term vision of community transformation that was grounded in the belief that those most affected by social inequalities must be central to the work that has to be done. This is a community-driven initiative that addresses health inequity in the immigrant community. CCC programming provides critical support to the immigrant community and develops resiliency and ability to care for itself as a community.

Tennyson Center for Children

Tennyson provides education, community-based, residential, and other therapeutic interventions for neglected, abused, and traumatized children. We are currently seeing foster families terminating their arrangement due to the COVID-19 crisis and are literally dropping foster children off to be returned to the system. Many families have lost jobs, are in crisis, and believe they no longer can afford to maintain the family placement of their foster child, resulting in great trauma to these youth. Our ability to work with families before they reach a crisis point is integral to helping them maintain family stability. This includes helping them access food. Many believe they can no longer afford to feed their foster youth and this is precipitating the return of children to foster care.

Colorado Health Network Inc.

CHN will use emergency funding to support to increase food provisions and provide delivery services in order to best support people living with HIV (PLHIV) at highest risk for severe COVID-19 disease.

For PLWH, maintaining a long and healthy life requires daily adherence to HIV antiretroviral treatment (ART). Food insecurity has been consistently been shown to be a major barrier for PLWH to adhere to ART and clinical care. These funds will provide an immediate impact on food access for one of Colorado’s most vulnerable populations. Success benchmarks will include the number of PLHIV supported, the number of meals provided and the general health of PLHIV participants.

Hope Communities

Hope Communities is an anchor institution and hub for services in all the communities in which they have properties. Statistics for their neighborhoods show 39% live in poverty vs. a regional average of 11%, and, at Hope, the percentage of households in poverty are event greater. Roughly 43% of their residents are refugees and 65% of households have dependents. Most of those we serve are African American, Southeast Asian or Latino. Hope is unique in that by providing programs and services to individuals at their place of residence or within their neighborhood, they can ensure community needs are being met. Food insecurity has been a growing issue across our properties and neighborhoods and Hope Communities plans to help meet this need.

Denver Green School

This organization is completely run with volunteer hours. There are no paid staff. !00% of funds received go to purchasing food. They will purchase more food than usual because of the need and because donations are down. They deliver all of food to families through volunteers. This helps many families that do not have access to transportation or who have children or family members they are taking care of at home and can not leave to go to the store. Currently approximately 75 people per day receive food. They deliver every day Monday-Saturday.

Denver Parks and Rec

In order to serve the essential/emergency personnel's children with emergency child care centers for 12.5 hours a day for five days a week, they are applying for this funding to support our meal program. They provide breakfast ($2.75 per meal), lunch ($3.41 per meal), snack ($.90 per snack), and dinner ($3.41 per meal). The amount they are requesting would support our program for four months, April-July. Revolution Foods provides healthy meals and snacks for these children. They deliver the meals to our center daily. The child care licensed programs serves a maximum of 20 youth per day, per program.

The Delores Project

The Delores Project is filling a critical need for trauma-informed shelter specifically tailored for women and transgender individuals and is responding to increased needs for safe shelter during the COVID-19 pandemic requiring more food for shelter guests. These individuals are at higher risk for contracting COVID, and are also experiencing chronic homelessness, extensive trauma, serious mental health issues, and/or medical disabilities. More than half report living with co-occurring chronic health conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes, or cancer. The agency often serves as a "shelter of last resort," accepting guests with medical and behavioral health needs too extensive for other shelters. Funding is assisting in feeding these individuals experiencing homelessness in Denver.

Senior Assistance Center

Senior Assistance Center provides emergency services to at risk seniors 55+ residing in the City and County of Denver. We provide emergency food bags via drive up on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesday by appointment and delivery by request.

The Rising/Mission Arvada

Mission Arvada operates the only day shelter in Jefferson County for persons experiencing homelessness. Since September 2017, the day shelter has been meeting basic human needs including two hot meals a day, showers, severe weather closet, and clothing bank. Funds received from the grant will be used to continue and expand services as need grows from the economic impacts of COVID-19. They fight hunger in their community with daily food distribution and a community food bank on Saturdays as well as disbursement of grocery rescue item on Mondays and Fridays for anyone in need of these resources.

Joy’s Kitchen

Joy's Kitchen provides immediate hungry relief to those experiencing food insecurity with a focus on filling that need with food recovery and rescue.

Hope House

Hope House Colorado helps at-risk teenage moms reach self-sufficiency. In addition to programs and classes, Hope House offers direct assistance in the form of rent, utility, meals and more. During COVID, Hope House is supporting teen moms through numerous initiatives, including Grab & Go food assistance.

Colfax Community Network

Colfax Community Network provides services for children and families experiencing homelessness or those who are housed precariously in Aurora, specifically around the Colfax Corridor. Food Pantry, Meals for CCN families, Drop-in Services, Case Management and Education Programming are its focus. Everyone is welcome at CCN.

Cherry Creek Schools Foundation

The Cherry Creek School district is receiving increased calls for aid from families that have immediate food access needs. While the district has established food distribution sites to continue providing food that students previously received in school, many families have been unable to access these services. Many of these students and families have been unable to take advantage of district food distribution and other community resources due to a lack of transportation or fears regarding their immigration status. These families have reached out to district teachers and staff for help and these funds will be used to provide food resources to these families.

St. Augustine Food Pantry

St. Augustine food pantry provides food to families in need and has seen an increase in demand since the COVID-19 crisis began. This funding will be used to purchase equipment and food items not available through our purchasing arrangement with Food Bank of the Rockies.

Kaizen Food Rescue

Kaizen Food Rescue is a community-wide grassroots organization that is collectively run by diverse constituent-led volunteers, who are interested in improving basic human needs for all Coloradans. We believe healthy food should be free and accessible to all.

Break Bread

Break Bread nourishes Littleton through building relationships and offering free community meals and support. All are welcome at Break Bread.

Second Chance Center

Second Chance Center serves formerly incarcerated people, and we are preparing and delivering single-serve hot meals and staples for the people being released from prison under the governor’s orders; we also deliver food to the previously homeless residents of our supportive housing program - some are elderly, many are in poor health from living on the streets, and we also have families with young children. In addition, clients stop by our pantry for staples and the ready-to-heat homemade meals they miss due to the COVID closure of our regular lunch program.

Emerald Gardens

We are young farmers growing microgreens for food access, grocery stores, restaurants, and direct to consumer markets. We are a rural farm in Bennett, CO working at the intersection of food justice, innovative technologies, land stewardship, community engagement, and support for new and beginning farmers. Our farm also serves as an aggregator with other farmers and distribution partners to develop a resilient and equitable local food system.

Fields Foundation

The Fields Foundation in collaboration with the Opportunity Center is currently providing emergency food assistance Monday through Saturday. Prior to COVID served approximately 150 to 200 families per week. Currently with the expansion of the food pantry they are now serving 30 to 50 families per day and continue to see around 100 families every weekend. By increasing the frequency of the food bank and opening after work hours they are seeing more families but an experiencing greater costs with providing these services.

WeeCycle

Founded in 2008, WeeCycle strives to improve the welfare of families and their children raised in poverty. We collect, “weecycle” and match essential baby gear - including baby formula, food and diapers - to families in need through our 50 plus nonprofit partner organizations focused on alleviating poverty, homelessness, domestic violence, teen pregnancy and under-employment as well as organizations serving immigrants and refugees.

Movement 5280

Movement 5280’s mission is to provide a "family of support" to homeless youth who have aged out of foster care and other at-risk young people lacking guidance as they transition to adulthood. During the Covid crisis, Movement 5280 is now feeding everyone rather than focusing solely on youth. Additionally, Movement 5280 is open daily rather than 3 days/week, offering food, hygiene kits, and a handwashing station (all provided outside of 5280’s building).

LEAF, Lyons Emergency & Assistance Fund

A Woman’s Place Inc.

Since 1977, A Woman’s Place has provided supportive services to victims of domestic violence in Weld County. Our free and confidential services include 24-hour emergency shelter and crisis line, legal advocacy, counseling, support groups and youth and family programs.

Kids At Their Best

KATB sprang from the need to feed hungry children in the summer months when school meals were no longer available. The 500+ kids range from kindergarten through college, come from many different places including Somalia, Mexico, and countries throughout South America. They speak 26 different languages. For 12 years, KATB has connected with these vulnerable children and families. These funds will be used to provide breakfast, lunch and suppers for hundreds of children over the summer.

Food Bank for Larimer County

Founded in 1984, the Food Bank for Larimer County is the central hub for charitable food distribution in our area, serving one in ten people in Larimer County. Each year, we collect and distribute enough food for more than 7.5 million meals. Our mission is to feed all in need through community partnerships and hunger-relief programs.

OneMorgan County

Morgan County's most marginalized residents--low-income immigrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers--are presently being underserved by existing food programs. This has resulted in a situation where marginalized families are choosing to decline food support in order to preserve their safety and dignity. Drawing upon deep connections to Morgan's newcomer communities--combined with OneMorgan County's already-existing linguistic and cultural competencies--they will address this need via a foodbox delivery system. This pilot project will begin by supporting 50 eligible households (presuming 5 members each), which will receive weekly boxes of culturally-relevant staple foods over the course of two months.

Under the Umbrella Logan County Colorado

Under the Umbrella Logan County Colorado provides free hot meals to all who come two days weekly. We provide emergency housing and services for the hurting, hungry, the homeless. We have a food pantry, hygience products, clothing, bedding, etc. as well. We network and partner with other agencies to help people find help in times of need. Spiritual support is an important part of our ministry as well.

Fighting to Farm

Fighting to Farm is committed to end food insecurity and hunger in underrepresented, underserved rural communities. Fighting to Farm supports local farmers and ranchers by procuring food and produce directly from local farms to distribute and deliver to rural, low income, disabled and senior residents. The goal is two fold, 1) supporting farmers through direct purchase 2) to provide fresh foods through safe food distribution to underrepresented, underserved rural residents in need.

The Peak

To date, The Peak has been entirely funded by the two people running who started the program in response to COVID-19. The Peak is feeding between 30-100 people per day that are unemployed from the food service industry, hotel, ski resort, and other related industries in the rural Winter Park area. Some of these unemployed are homeless, or in very insecure housing situations. Most don't have cars and have difficulty accessing the food bank which is 17 miles away, or even local affordable grocery shopping. They are providing this group most in need with likely the only hot meal of the day.

Grand River Meals on Wheels

Grand River Meals on Wheels improves health/well-being of home-bound elderly, hospice, disabled & recovering clients by providing a daily hospital prepared home delivered meal, a safety check, along with reducing isolation/lonliness in western Garfield Co.

Routt County Council on Aging

Almost overnight and with little warning, Routt County Council on Aging’s (RCCOA) group meal program became a meal delivery service. Although RCCOA already has a very robust Meals on Wheels program, the organization and its staff had to adapt quickly and creatively to convert its popular 3-location group lunch program into a home-delivery meal service to ensure that our on-site clients received food after the “Stay At Home” Order. Where there was once a robust group meal program, staff was now preparing hundreds of fresh meals and packaging them up in trays to be home-delivered to our clients. This process is much more time-consuming and costly than the production of meals served to an on-site group setting. RCCOA’s food costs rose 25% as a result of quickly adjusting their senior meal services.

Town of Oak Creek Kids Program

This funding will provide nutritional food free of cost to children in South Routt which is a isolate rural area. South Routt is roughly 30 minutes from Steamboat and has about three places that residents can buy food. These locations do not accept any sort of food assistance and often the food is on the more expensive side. Anyone who gets food assistance needs to go to Steamboat. This presents one of the biggest barriers people in this community face; transportation. This work is being done in collaboration with a number of partners in town.

Snow Bowl Partners LLC

The Family Bowl initiative is to provide free carry-out meals to restaurant and service industry employees who have recently lost their jobs, and to community members who cannot afford a daily hot meal. All meals are being cooked and provided by Snow Bowl Steamboat, with food donations coming in from local restaurants and financial contributions into the Family Bowl Go Fund Me campaign.

Boys & Girls Club of the High Rockies

We are a remote county the size of Delaware that has a significant low-income population and many workers that rely on industries heavily affected by COVID such as tourism and small businesses. In our entire county, we have one grocery store that is small and open for limited hours during the day. We need to have food purchased and at the ready that deputies can deliver to remote families, that are familiar with local non-profit staff and more willing to take food from known local entities, and so that we can supplement our food banks as their resources are starting to dwindle as more and more people are using benefits than ever before in our county. We have an estimate of 18,845 citizens with a pre-COVID poverty rate of 9%. Our DHS office is experiencing an unprecedented amount of county citizens applying for help and our food banks are starting to experience a marked reduction in their food supply as the need grows. We only expect the need to grow. We have a more difficult time than most trying to count the individuals served by our food banks because the minute we start to collect too much information it decreases the amount of people that will use our resources. We have never tried a community partnership of this level before on food resources so we can certainly start to count those served the best we can but up until now it has always been more individual silos in the county feeding different populations. We have created a team (the Emergency Assistance Team -E.A.T.) with a hotline as well as online reporting options. We are co-chaired by Boys & Girls Club and the Park County Sheriff.

Our food banks are serving up to 865 individuals weekly plus the food that our sheriff deputies and victim assistance team delivers to victims of crimes which are not as easily tracked. We are running a 24/7 emergency assistance phone line for county members to call in their needs.

Summit School District

Since March 18, Summit School District has taken their role as a community leader seriously. They have been delivering food to eight different locations within our county in hopes of feeding all of the community. They have consistently provided approximately 450 meals per day, including during our spring break, to our hungry students. With this grant, they plan to continue this meal delivery and distribution through the summer.

Foodbank of Kiowa Creek Community Church

Pre-Coronavirus monthly capital expenditures for meat protein, dairy, fresh and shelf stable foods, child friendly foods and personal hygiene products averaged $250 per month. In March and April of this year our client base has doubled (37 to 85), with new clients every day, the frequency of visits has tripled (42 to 91), and our capital expenditures for food have quadrupled ($245 to $1187). Pre-COVID, the client base was primarily persons on disability, low income individuals, single mothers, and those living on a limited pension or social security, most of whom qualified for USDA programs. Now there are many individuals or families where the primary wage earner is unemployed due to the COVID-19 shutdown.

Boys & Girls Club of Fremont County

We would use this funding towards providing food through the emergency childcare center for essential workers. There is a huge need in this county for school aged child care (we serve youth 4.5-18). We have worked out longer hours to serve our local hospital staff in particular, and are open Monday through Friday 6:30-7:30pm. Because of these long hours, they are serving three meals per day, plus snacks. At 60 youth per day, or more, hopefully, that's a lot of food! Fremont County is a low-income county, and most of the families are on free or reduced lunch already.

Community Partnership Family Resource Center

CP switched operations from delivering programming to families to serving as an emergency hub for the community the same day schools announced closures. CP’s office has been receiving food and supplies donations since many food banks, churches, and all schools are closed. CP has extended business hours to Monday to Friday, 8am-5pm for food deliveries and pick-ups, assembling food boxes, volunteer coordination, and to manage phones. As food supplies are collected at CP, food boxes are made; boxes are either delivered or picked up curbside outside CP’S offices to address transportation barriers and access. CP estimates serving 58 meals daily to positively impact families and children in need of food and resources.

The Green Thumb Initiative

The Green Thumb Initiative (GTI) is a Colorado non-profit founded in October 2018, with the intent to contribute to improving community health in a predominantly rural area. GTI serves Fremont County in Southern Colorado with population 46,824 from the 2010 census. In the last 10 years, approximately 16% of the county's population live under the federal poverty level, and over 3,000 households each year are recipients of food-related social benefits. The Majority of the county areas meet the qualifications of a "food desert". In addition, a constant group of people in need of food, shelter and health services come to Canon City, the seat of Fremont County, in need of emergency assistance. GTI is in a process of implementing and operating an Emergency Meal Health kitchen providing three prepared meals a day to be dropped off at the Quarantine Shelter as well as to the addresses of referred families in need where one or more family members has serious chronic health needs.

Pueblo Cooperative Care Center (Pueblo’s Food Bank)

Pueblo Cooperative Care (PCCC) IS PUEBLO’S FOOD BANK needs grant funding to assist with the purchase of additional food items used in its emergency food sacks which are also supplemented by food from Care and Share Food Bank and USDA’s The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP). Food sacks include a variety of foodstuffs such as beans, rice, flour, sugar, meats, breads, cereals, canned goods and other items.
Without PCCC’s drive through and mobile emergency food sack delivery service (NOW Project), thousands of Puebloans would go hungry and without food.

Family Promise (Interfaith Hospitality Network)

Family Promise of Colorado Springs (formerly Interfaith Hospitality Network) has been strengthening the El Paso County Community since 1996 by empowering families with children to overcome barriers to affordable housing and improved economic circumstances. They know that families are stronger and more successful when they are able to stay together while overcoming the challenges of homelessness.

With the need to quarantine and protect especially our elderly church volunteers, the support congregations are unable to host families for at least the next month (and likely longer) effective as of Sunday, March 15th. This has required Family Promise to provide housing, food, diapers, wipes, formula, toilet paper, cleaning, personal hygiene, and other necessary supplies for these vulnerable families.

Baca County Food Bank

Funding will be used to purchase food for distribution. Baca County Food Bank is a non-profit that depends on donations to stay in operation. Their goal is to make sure no one has to go hungry during this pandemic ordeal as our numbers of recipients have doubled and keep increasing. Food boxes contain approximately 14 days of food and boxes vary in size depending on the number of people in the household. They distribute food boxes twice a month and also available every day for emergency boxes for those that don't have enough food to last until the next distribution day.

Mt. Carmel Health

Mt. Carmel's focus is programs to promote healthy lifestyles, wellness and prevention, and education enrichment. In a community without a food pantry during the COVID crisis, Mt. Carmel is delivering food baskets to vulnerable and hungry families who have no other access to food resources. We are serving hundreds of people through our food basket program ensuring they have a life line during the current crisis.

Wiley United Methodist Church

As a teacher at the school, and a parent in the community, a member of the Wiley United Methodist Church was extremely worried about several kids and families that rely on these lunches and breakfasts daily and went to my church to see what we could do to help. Food for Kids - Grab and Go lunch program was immediately established and is now serving approximately 75 kids each pick up day. Pick up is on Tuesdays and Thursdays and offers two lunches each time - a hot lunch and a cold/sack lunch.

Montezuma Senior Services

Montezuma Senior Services Home-Delivered meal count sprang up from 1,000 meals to 2,000 in a one-week period. The growth has slowed and if we remain at this pace we expect to see a final number of around 3,000 total meals going out each month. That is two-thousand extra meals per month. We anticipate this to occur for 5-6 months due to the vulnerable population being served. This center is the only Montezuma County agency delivering meals on wheels. Our need is for the funding of frozen meal kits.

Durango Food Bank

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, food banks/pantries across the nation have had to adjust their entire distribution practices in order to continue their missions. Like all these other agencies, the Durango Food Bank has completely modified all procedures and policies in order to get desperately needed food in to the homes of families who are struggling at this time. Their client numbers immediately rose from 80-100 households per week, to nearly 200 during a single drive up distribution. They are receiving hundreds of requests for home deliveries that are are being completed by a small and dedicated group of volunteers. Each of these households are receiving 1-2 weeks worth of supplies for their families.

South-Central Colorado Seniors Inc.

As the area agency on aging, South-Central Colorado Seniors Inc. sees and reaches older adults in dire need of food, healthy food. The funding from this grant will be used to feed those in need, to help those eat healthy, and those that are unable to be reached. Funding helps purchase disposables such as food containers, warming bags for hot meals, and additional food.

San Luis Valley Area Health Education Center

The funding is sought to reach residents of the San Luis Valley whose needs are currently not being addressed by the current food distribution services in place. Below is a description of unique needs of the organizations that are collaborating on this project.
The Immigrant Resources Center estimates that in the upcoming month between 150 and 200 families will seek food assistance from their office. This influx can be attributed the instability of the local Mushroom Farm and all things COVID related. A majority of these families are undocumented and will not seek assistance from the local food pantry’s, but they will go to the IRC office because there is a trusted relationship. In addition, IRC is able to meet different dietary needs.

Town of Mountain Village

Through Town funding and donations Town of Mountain Village has been able to serve 74 families with a weekly food share for 23 weeks, which began April 15. They currently have 16 families on the waitlist to get into the program, and that number is growing every day. In order to aid these 16 families and their food supply needs needed these additional funds. This program has been the heart of their community and they want to try and serve all those in need.

Center Consolidated Schools 26JT

Center Consolidated schools will use this funding to support efforts to provide daily breakfast and lunch to the student population. In addition, this will support providing weekly food bags for dinners and weekend food to homeless students/families. This includes providing funding for food, staff to prep and bag the food, and for food deliveries. This funding will support staff to prep and prepare food bags with daily breakfasts and lunches for the school week available to all students in the district. They will also provide a food pick-up for the whole week on Mondays from 10 AM-1 PM. In addition, staff will purchase and prep food baskets for our homeless families. This is about 160 food bags.

Moffat Cons. School District #2

Moffat Cons. School District #2 has been providing meals to any child 0-18 since March 23rd in our community. We are committed to no child going hungry!

Creede School District

This funding will allow the district to continue to offer free lunches to our students who cannot attend school in person during the Covid crisis. They will define success as all children being providing with free, healthy lunch on the days that they normally would have attended school. They serve approximately 60 meals per day at this time. It is served in a grab and go fashion and served both at the school and in the town of South Fork where 25% of our students live (30 minutes away). The main goal of this funding is to lessen financial burden of our families and to ensure that children continue to have a healthy daily meal. Without local tourism, many families are currently out of work with their children learning remotely from home.

Good Food Collective, writing for the La Plata & San Juan Counties Food Assistance Coalition

The La Plata & San Juan Counties Food Assistance Coalition is a voluntary convening of food assistance providers operating under our Office of Emergency Management’s ESF-6 Response Team. We work collaboratively to meet the food needs of every member of our region during the COVID pandemic.

Reaching Out to Community and Kids

Reaching Out to Community and Kids has been providing drive-through emergency provisions for Dolores County and Egnar, in San Miguel County. Due to funding restrictions, ROCK prioritized food in our past 3 distributions. ROCK is serving hundreds of families through these distributions. Due to pandemic, the growing number of individuals in need is causing storage constraints and requiring additional work for staff and volunteers to store the food. ROCK plans to use funding towards a new refrigerator expense, folding tables expenses, and staff expenses (only if other needs are met first).

Montezuma Food Coalition

The Montezuma Food Coalition actively engages communication and collaboration between organizations working to meet their community’s needs. We are raising funds as a Coalition to facilitate the purchase, storage, and distribution of emergency food to area organizations. We prioritize the food needs in Montezuma and Dolores counties, the food needs of Tribal or Indigenous led efforts, and food work that is led by and serves marginalized communities whose needs are not being adequately supported at this time.

Nutrition Services - Mesa County Valley School District 51

Funding will be used to provide meals Monday thru Friday (lunch and breakfast) to all youth age 18 and under. They are focused on high poverty areas and provide safe, curbside pick-up of meals at 11 locations. The district also use a mobile food truck to deliver at three neighborhood stops. In the first week they served 13,600 meals, 19, 857 meals in the second week, and 21,774 meals in the third week. The goal is to serve a minimum of 4,000 meals per day. They also have partnered with Food Bank of the Rockies and Kids Aid Backpack Program to have food boxes available for families to take home.

Mountain Roots Food Project

This emergency food relief program provides healthy suppers for a family of four, twice a week, delivered to their homes on Tuesdays and Fridays, on a sliding scale from $0 - $20. With senior meals being prepared and delivered by Young at Heart program, breakfast/lunch being delivered by schools, and Gunnipacks covering weekends for 50 kids, they identified a gap for prepared suppers for families in need and launched the Family Supper Program. Noticing how local restaurants were struggling to stay open with meager takeout business, they approached several and asked if they’d be willing to be “repurposed” one or two days a week to creating suppers for low-income families instead of their usual takeout menu. Restaurants are paid a fair price for the meals (covering food cost and labor) which helps them to recover revenues lost due to closure and use up standing inventory. Deliveries are made by Mountain Roots staff using the MR van and two vans from the Food Pantry.

The Learning Council

The Learning Council is a community nonprofit with a focus on agriculture and health education. We provide meals to our community with a focus on local and organic foods becoming available to people in need in our community including families with children and low income, elders, LGBTQ+, migrant workers and all who seek nourishing lovingly prepared food. We support our local farmers by purchasing food from them at market price, hosting a farmers market that accepts SNAP and Double up Bucks , and we hire farmers to teach our agricultural classes.

Western Colorado Food Agriculture Council DBA: Valley Food Partnership

Valley Food Partnership (VFP) strengthens the regional food system and community well-being through education, access to quality local foods, and promotion of sustainable agricultural practices. VFP runs Montrose Farmers Market (MFM) and safe operations are a priority due to COVID-19. VFP is developing 1).Food Boxes for distribution to low-income vulnerable residents; and 2). Curbside pickup for MFM customers; both including locally grown, healthy food.