How you can help feed the hungry

“One of my favorite errands every other month is shopping for groceries not meant for me or my family.

A few years ago, I heard about a truly wonderful way to help feed hungry neighbors and immediately signed up. And I’ve been doing it ever since.

Last Saturday, I put two bright green bags full of non-perishable groceries out on my front porch, and a little later, watched volunteers come and take them away. I do this five months a year, and it is one of the happiest, easiest, and most rewarding things I can do for others in our community.

The Thurston County Food Project first began in Olympia in 2010 with just a few people in neighborhoods collecting food in brown paper bags. They collected a little over $12,000 worth of food that year. By 2018, they expanded to 600 donors in 13 neighborhoods, and then 20 neighborhoods in 2021. There are now more than 35 neighborhoods in Thurston County, including the South Capitol, collecting food donations every other month.

Green bags picked up from homes last Saturday filled 250 boxes with groceries worth $16,835 that will provide 10,877 meals to those in need. So far this year, nearly $64,000 worth of food has been collected and over $10,000 in cash has been donated, which adds up to $74,000 or 40,697 meals.

That’s a lot of meals. And there’s two more pickups still to come.

How does it work? If you choose to participate, a neighborhood coordinator brings a bright green bag to your home. You even get a handy refrigerator magnet with the dates.

When shopping for your groceries, you purchase extra items to fill the bag. On the second Saturday of every even month, you set the bag outside your front door in the morning and neighborhood coordinators collect it and deliver it to the Thurston County Food Bank. It’s that easy.

The next green bag pickup will be Saturday, October 14 and the last pickup for 2023 will be Saturday, December 9.

12% of residents in Washington struggle with food insecurity.
49% of Food Bank customers, around 27,000, are under 18.
The food bank serves around 57,000 households annually.

Interested in learning more about the project? Go to the project’s website at http://www.thurstoncountyfoodproject.org.

Want to participate? Please email Neighborhood Coordinator Jennifer Meyer at tcfpscn@gmail.com or text her at 360.556.7619.