 Welcome to Serving Locally with Me, your host, Michelle Dainis, the podcast where we spotlight service in the Longmont and surrounding communities. All right, let's connect. Hi, welcome to this week's episode of Serving Locally with Me, your host, Michelle. As you have noticed, my hair is a different length. I got a whole bunch of it cut off and donated to Children's with Hair Loss a couple of weeks ago. So this is the new look for the new year. Since I am now Mrs. Longmont 2024, I will get new banners and stuff. But I'm looking forward to serving again this year and seeing where that goes and continuing the podcast. Today, we are talking about the Longmont Food Rescue and we have Naomi here. And we just want to talk about like who are you and what is the Longmont Food Rescue and just a quick little overview. Sure. Hi, I'm Naomi Courland. I am the executive director for Longmont Food Rescue. We are a small non-profit operating in Longmont and surrounding communities. Our mission is to take food that might otherwise go to waste and bring it to where people need it, people facing insecurity right here in Longmont. So what that looks like is we rescue food from grocery stores, farmers markets, individual farms and convenience stores and bring it to low income housing sites. We work with homeless outreach centers. We also work with other service providers like mental health partners, recovery cafe, basically places where people might already be receiving services or where they're living so that it brings the food to the people. One of our core foundational values is to remove any barriers to access or stigma around receiving food services. We also host some public open distributions so where anyone can come and get food and we really just try to make it easy for people who need healthy fresh nutritious food to get it in our community. Awesome. That sounds so good and all around. Can you give us just a little bit of a background about your organization? Sure. So we were founded in 2017 and since then we've just grown every year in terms of our programming, our reach, the type of food we're able to get and the communities we can connect with. Started with farmers market rescues. That's very seasonal. We still do those and started branching out to grocery stores and convenience stores. Like I said, those convenience stores, they have grab and go food, which is really, really nice for our unhoused community. So things like repackaged sandwiches, salads and all of that. So we've been able to kind of just expand the types of services we can provide in response to what we see as a need in the community. So as we work with new partners, new other non-profit partners that are doing other service work in the community, as well as housing sites and talking to community members, taking surveys of our community, finding out what type of food people need, where they need it. We're able to then grow and expand and respond to that by identifying what kind of food we can get donated and brought to those sites. So yeah, I was brought in in actually spring of 2020. I was hired. So it happened to be my first week was the week that everything locked down. So we changed our service model a lot that year. We just saw a huge need increase. People who had never received services before or not in a while, all of a sudden needed it in addition to the existing need that we were seeing in our community. So we just started really trying to grow that year, increasing how many public distributions, how many sites we worked with on the residential side. And since then, even as we've come back to in-person hangouts and work and all of that, we've seen the long-term need. And so kind of the trajectory since 2017 has been this slow, steady growth, but really from 2020 on, it kind of exploded in response to what we were seeing in the community. So yeah, we continue to grow and try new programs. We've got a new program called Longmont Community Fridges that was launched last year. And that's to just even more try to bring food into the community, create hubs for people who might be working, multiple jobs, have kids, childcare, all sorts of things that can overlap with most service hours for food pantries and food banks. And so how are you going to try to fit that in your day if they're just open Monday through Friday during work hours, right? Exactly, work and school hours. Exactly. So to have a lot of our services, we try to focus on weekends, off hours. And now with these fridges, they're the first 24-7 accessible food access hubs in Longmont. So at any time, someone could drop by and see if there's food in the fridge and pantry. That's amazing. Yeah, just, you know, okay, now what? Oh, what are we doing for dinner? You know, let's just go to the fridge and find out if there's something there. So that's incredible. Is there any sign up or anything for that? Or is that just going to open? That is totally open. And so like I said earlier, one of our foundational goals is to really any barriers to access, any red tape, any paperwork, we try to get rid of that because we figure if people are trying to find food resources at our community, they probably need it. They need it. It's not something that we need to gatekeep or need to make harder to get. And so these fridges, they're like the little free libraries, right? I was just going to say that. Yeah. So, you know, it's not about, you know, anyone needing to fill something out or get access to them. And that's why we try to place them in places that are accessible 24 hours a day, outdoors at different hubs. One's at a hospital, Longmont United Hospital. One is at Agatbe Safe Haven, which is a homeless outreach program. And one is at a church, Heart of Longmont Church. And so we're going to continue to grow this program. It's just under a year old right now. So we've got three sites so far and looking to expand. But we're looking at places, like I said, where people might already be getting a service, stopping through and could use those fresh food resources. Sometimes it's hard to ask for more. And sometimes it's hard to say, hey, I need, I need help this week with groceries. So that even that tears down that barrier also. Yeah, the infertile stigma of that guilt or that whatever feeling that they might be having. So that's that's incredible. That's an incredible idea. I love that. Thank you. Yeah, that can be a really big barrier, especially if it's like, yeah, maybe you haven't sought food services before or you haven't, it didn't work out well or you didn't qualify or something about barely qualify or filling out the paperwork, kind of stopped halfway through and felt some sort of internal barrier there. This is just saying, you know, the food is there, come get it if you need it and need to eat. Yeah. And especially with the fridges, there's not even anyone there. We maintain them. We check in on food quality. We check on on, you know, if things need to be cleaned out, if there's fridge maintenance. So we do have volunteers that come by to check in on the fridges during the week. But otherwise, they're just open community resources. That's incredible. Absolutely incredible. So what is your focus at the Longmont Food Rescue? My personal focus or a general focus. Both. So as executive director, I am really about program development and finding these opportunities, making these relationships, the connections. I really love finding affiliated organizations that where we can, you know, become more valuable than the sum of our parts, you know, have a greater impact because we're working together. When you're speaking to my time, that's exactly what this is about. Yeah. So I really kind of try to foster relationships, not just with food donors and the recipient sites, but other nonprofits who are doing similar work. So we're not reinventing the whale or overlapping services. We're working together to increase services. We work for the community fridge program that is actually a collaboration with Uproot Colorado, and they are a nonprofit that does gleaning. So that means they go to farms and there's a practice where farms will grow more than what they're going to sell because you might have blights. You want to just have extra. There might be food that just won't sell on the shelf or whatever. Exactly. It's ugly. And so stuff gets left in the field that won't get harvested. And so Uproot comes, they pick what won't get harvested or pick up that kind of excess that has been harvested, but can't go to market. And then they bring it to organizations like ours that get it out into the community. And so this fridge program was a collaboration with them because especially during harvest season, there's an excess, which is wonderful, but we want to make sure that it can get out to people. And if there's not an open food bank or there's not a distribution happening that day, we wanted to have cold storage that's accessible to the community whenever they need it. And so that came out of that partnership. So that's just one example of a collaboration where we're able to do more because we're working with others. So that's one of the things I personally in my job get very passionate about is being able to reach more people with these community partners. That's fantastic. So what's the organization focus? The organization focus. So I would say that Long Lawn Food Rescues, our focus is twofold. It is reducing food waste and feeding people. So it's hunger relief. And it's also looking at the fact that we have such a bounty. We have more food. So incredibly blessed. Than what we can sell and consume on a commercial level. So like I mentioned with uproot in the fields, that's one area, you know, just at the point of creation. And then all through the chain of distribution, transport, there can be waste along the way all the way up until the consumer gets the store and then, you know, food waste that you don't actually eat what you buy. So there's this whole chain of where food waste can happen. And we try to find different opportunities along that chain of like, well, if that food could go directly to where someone needs it, could it be eaten that day? Maybe it's a little more perishable. Maybe it needs to be eaten that week. But for people who are living paycheck to paycheck or week to week, who are struggling to keep nutritious food on their table, that's such a boon to say, here, here's some food you can eat now, right? Here you go. So it's, it's making sure that those resources that we already have, don't go into a landfill where they're going to create methane gas. So there's an environmental aspect to, to that food waste component that if it goes into a landfill, it creates methane. It's really bad for greenhouse gases, much more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2. So keeping it out of the landfill, putting it into people's fridges, stomachs, strengthening our community. And so, and then you get into that second part of the mission, which is the hunger relief and really identifying, you know, where are people facing food and nutrition insecurity? We do try to focus on this nutritionally dense food, fresh produce. When we do have additional purchasing power through grants, we will supplement what we're donated with high quality proteins, nutrient dense proteins, because that is often requested and harder for people to find. So really trying to address what are the nutritional needs because hunger relief is one thing and food insecurity is one thing, but then you can fill with a lot, but it can be kind of empty food that isn't supporting the health of people who need that health support the most oftentimes, who are already maybe challenged with health concerns. We work with a lot of senior living centers, apartment complexes, low income, people who are living on a fixed income. And they might already be dealing with disability, other sorts of illness and aging, where they really need that nutritionally dense food, they really need food that's going to support their health, so they can live their fullest lives. And so we do try to prioritize that when we have a donation that maybe we couldn't completely get out into the community or fill a car or fill a vehicle and we're like, okay, we're going to run out of room, we're going to always prioritize what's fresh, what's healthy, what's nutritious, what's going to really supplement as opposed to some things that might be cheaper, but less nutritious. Right, just filler. Yeah. No, I have a yeah, I'm all about nutrition. So who are you trying to reach with your organization? So with our programs, we really are looking at where the need is in the community. And like I said, there is some partnerships that are more residential, finding low income housing sites, we work with Longmont Housing Authority to identify, we work with Elder Share Program to identify where people seeking food resources and we can bring it directly to where people live. We also work with like the homeless outreach programs I mentioned, mental health partners and Recovery Cafe and then Youth Center, Longmont Youth Center and YMCA preschool to reach families and youth and then with those public distributions, it's really inviting in anyone who feels that they are needing these resources and are having a hard time, you know, doing if you're paying for housing and electricity, utilities, childcare, fuel, all the other things that often time there's not a way to get resources around or support. If it's a choice between keeping the lights on and putting food on the table, like can we help you put food on the table? Those are the people we're trying to reach and you know, we work with just a huge variety of people. As far as our volunteer side of things and who we reach there, anyone who's passionate about food, who's passionate about hunger, relief, who cares about the environment, there's so many things about our organization that could appeal to a volunteer and so if any of what we do aligns with your passions, we would love to have you on board. Absolutely. What makes the work of the Longmont Food Rescue different than other similar serving organizations? The fridge thing obviously is a huge thing. That's fantastic. Yeah, that's a new program and like I said, that was in response to the question or concern that would come up around the timing of when a lot of other service providers are open and in operation and even when we bring food to where people live or when we do the public food distributions, those are still at set times, set days of the week. The main thing though that I think we do that is a little different from other organizations working Longmont is look at that removal barrier to access, see how can we make it easiest for people to get these resources and not have to fill out paperwork, not have to show proof of need or proof of residency or proof proof proof that you're somehow qualifying for these services because there is enough food to feed our whole community. There is food out there if we can get the resources together, can do the rescue transportation and distribution, those are the bigger barriers than the actual resources and so there's no benefit in trying to hold on to this because it's going to spoil if we do that. The faster it's out, the more people come, the better it is. If it's in a storage, if it's in a warehouse somewhere and I think that the larger organizations, the ones that might have paperwork or other constraints, a lot of that is due to their funding models, federal funding models often almost always require certain reporting metrics that require them to take data about who's receiving their services to fill out paperwork to show that they are qualifying for benefits or that they are residents of Longmont because that's what some of their funders require. I very much empathize with those nonprofits that have to work under that model but I do know it's talking to our clients, talking to our recipients, how much of a barrier that can be for so many people, whether they even qualify but even if they would qualify going there, getting there, having that internal feeling of whether, oh, do I really want to show up to this place? It's recorded that I needed help which should, in today's society, is not okay that we need help and I want people to see it's okay to need help. We all need help. We are on food stamps, we were going to the community food, we were going to the food banks and stuff for a while just because with my health and stuff and trying to raise kids and my husband's working and it just wasn't enough and there is a bit of shame and there shouldn't be and so I want to bring delight that you know just because you might need help it's okay. It's okay to need help sometimes and we shouldn't shame anybody else and we shouldn't look down on that and we want to help each other and I think that's what makes a community strong is that you want to help other people. Yeah absolutely so at our public distributions the only question we will ask is how many people you're feeding so that we can see how much food we have and try to give an appropriate amount for your household. We often have people picking up from multiple households because they're picking up for someone who can't drive, you know lots of folks who come from those those senior residential sites where people are disabled who might not have access to a vehicle picking up for their neighbor we see that a lot so by not asking anything more than how many people they're trying to feed that that really opens doors to people feeling comfortable and empowers them too to be sharing the resources. It makes me so happy when I hear about our recipients who are bringing an extra bag for their neighbor and tell me a story about how oh this you know last week this totally fed our whole you know apartment complex basically you know like this this got spread around that's always just what we want to see is this ongoing sharing of resources the idea of it being a community resource a community asset and I think that sharing model that kind of gifting model is it is an abundance model it's where you start seeing people sharing and then they want to share more we've had so many people who came to us as recipients who then became volunteers who got so excited about what we're doing and felt the impact of what we were doing and said how can I get more involved how can I help and I think a lot of that is due to our model and how it is a little different in that we're just trying to get the food out into the community that's awesome that's fantastic so what are the greatest needs that you guys face at Longmont Food Rescue I think it's similar to probably most small nonprofits so yes the two greatest needs are volunteers and funding um we we have an amazing act of volunteer base we are a very small non-profits still we have two part-time employees myself included currently we're looking to expand but building up resources for staff time takes funding and so currently we're majority vast majority volunteer run organization we have a volunteer board who's very active and like between 45 and 50 really active volunteers on a monthly basis but we can always use more support on the volunteer department you know if you wanted to get involved we have food rescue opportunities we also have those on-site distributions so if you like working with the community or being there when people are accessing food there's opportunities for that our fridges have volunteers that check on their maintenance the farmers market shift is one that is just this time of year gets really busy so we have a we've got a lot of food at the farmers market that could be rescued and so the more volunteers we have on a Saturday to help us pick that up the better and as far as the funding goes I know that's just non-profit world right you're always trying to get funding and for us you know our funding model is a mix of grants and foundation funding but really the heart and soul of it is those local donations those individual donors because that's where you build relationships you get that sustainable funding you're not constantly applying for different grant cycles and hoping that this time they're going to fund you it's it's the people see the value of what we're doing in the community and say yeah I want to invest in this program sticking around yeah so always the top two I'm sure um I wish I would have won the lottery that that one point what five billion dollars and I could say be able man man would be able to strengthen the community with that do you have any events coming up or volunteer opportunities yes so um in addition to the farmers market rescue which as I mentioned could use volunteers in the in the summertime as especially this time of summer when it's really going um that's on Saturdays it's a great way to hang out at the market and then pick up food and bring it somewhere that could really use it we also have pop-up produce distributions and that is also in partnership with uproot colorado where they glean at the at the farms and bring a lot of extra produce to the longmont united hospital parking lot one of those hubs that has one of our fridges at it too so those are once a month in the summer so we've got one coming up um august 18th I don't know if this is going to be out probably later than that so we'll also have one in september and so there's volunteer opportunities to help with those pop-up distributions those events to help with bagging the food and distributing it and then we we just have ongoing volunteer opportunities for if you whether you like picking up food and bringing it doing that rescue component or whether you want to be part of these onsite distributions other volunteer opportunities you know we do some events like fundraising events or you know just kind of community events and we have opportunities to get involved if you're really into our programs if you really want to be part of the community fridges we sometimes host paintathons when it's time for painting or refurbishing a fridge so if you stay tuned to our social media you can find out about that we often have local artists who help design what's going to be painted on the fridges I've seen they're very pretty yeah yeah fun yeah um so we've had artists from firehouse art center design some and then we had an independent artist that's living in the Boulder County area do another and so there's ways to get involved with lots of our programs so if you find one that you're really like oh I really care about this or you know opportunities with anything else you might think is a valuable skill you could you could offer so for example one of our board members who used to be a volunteer and then joined our board she is a website designer and she's working on a new website design for us right now how stuff is yeah yeah so I mean we're excited to launch a new website in the next few months so um that's all thanks to a volunteer who got really passionate about it and wanted to get more involved so um definitely the food rescue the pop-up distributions those are kind of immediate on the ground kind of help us at the farmers market the Saturday um but for more long term if you really want to get involved with our mission and organization there's opportunities for that too awesome how can people contact and find out more about long mount food rescue of course I'll have everything on my qr code they'll be there and then in the show notes and everything you'll find it on facebook and my facebook and instagram so but yeah how do you get all this information that she's going to share with you it'll be there of course as you know we'll all make it easy for you it's our website is longmontfoodrescue.org and so all of our contact information is also there um if you want to send us an email and don't want to go to longmontfoodrescue.org you can just do info at longmontfoodrescue.org perfect very straightforward on social media we're on facebook longmontfoodrescue and on instagram longmontfoodrescue so it's fantastic very easy um I will say that our long month community fridges program we have a separate website for that just because it has a nice landing page where you can look at a map and see where our fridges are located and as we add more locations they'll pop up on the map so that one is longmontcommunityfridges.org and we also have an instagram for that this long month community fridges so we're pretty easy to find if you just did a google search that would all come up too it's pretty much how I found you guys probably yeah it's just community food or community in longmont and you find all kinds of stuff it's fantastic it's wonderful um is there anything else you'd like to add to the conversation maybe I forgot or do you just feel passionate that you want to talk about for just a couple minutes um I am just really grateful for this opportunity I'm so happy to get our message our programs our mission out to the greater long month community um we have noticed um increased needs so you would think that maybe 2020 was going to be the height of it but actually yeah we've seen annual increase in people seeking our services um I believe we had 15 percent increase between 2021 and 2022 in people seeking our services so that was just like the last two years from this that year to this year we're seeing similar trends so just helping get the word out both about what we do but then supporting what we do whether that's volunteering whether that's donating however you can if you have food resources that you want to donate if you have time if if there's a connection that you think would be useful to us that we might not already have we want to better serve the community that's our overall you know driving force is how can we get more food to where people need it and that's how we approach all our program areas like what can we do to make this easier for everyone and reach more people have a greater impact so if anything that I spoke about today resonates with you inspires you if you have an idea if you're excited please reach out um and we're also out at community events we're not just at the farmers market every Saturday you can come say hi to us but we also are going to be at art walk on September 9th we'll have a booth set up with anima arts working on that fridge program so we'll be talking about the community fridges there you come say hi to us if you see us tabling ever um please connect and please connect online you know find us and we're share share pictures yeah yeah reshare what we're doing you'd never know what you sharing somebody else's picture that who is that who's going to see that and then be like oh you know what I know somebody that could use that or maybe I could use that or that it just those those those seeds are planted and um you know oh you know I really that's a really good idea or you know and um so the more you share and I know everything is share share share and it's true though that that couple of seconds in front of people it it spreads so much information and can help it can help so many people and um so yeah just to I'm so thankful that we we finally got to connect to to be on here so that way I could I can um put this out and hopefully and hopefully connect more people to things that they need and and things that they want to be involved with so thank you so much for being on today thank you Michelle thank you to my guests my listeners and my supporters serving together we can strengthen our community please like and subscribe do all those other things you know you got to do them because that's the easiest way to that you can serve right now all right now go connect with others and be a blessing