Posted on November 25, 2021
| 4:00 p.m.
As we prepare rejoice the vacations with our households and associates this vacation season let’s additionally take a while to consider giving again to our communty. Be part of Noozhawk this #GivingTuesday and make a donation to a neighborhood nonprofit.
Noozhawk is teaming up with native nonprofits to encourage you to participate within the worldwide day of giving, which takes place on November thirtieth, 2021.
It’s no secret that this previous 12 months and a half has been filled with challenges. Within the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, native nonprofits want your assist now greater than ever.
Our Good for Santa Barbara Nonprofit Section offers all of the sources you might want to donate this vacation season, together with a full Giving Guide with a listing of native nonprofits who want your assist this Giving Tuesday.
On this interview, Noozhawk spoke with Diana O’Connell, Govt Director at Veggie Rescue, to study extra about how the nonprofit is devoted to bettering the diet and high quality of life for neighborhood members who’re combating meals insecurity by offering them with wholesome, native produce and top quality ready meals.
Veggie Rescue
Query: What’s the title & mission of your nonprofit?
Reply: The mission of Veggie Rescue is to enhance the diet and high quality of life for neighborhood members who’re combating meals insecurity by offering them with wholesome, native produce and high-quality ready meals, and to work with farmers and native companies to scale back meals waste.
To hold out our mission, Veggie Rescue companions with 50+ farms and companies in SB County to rescue contemporary produce that might in any other case go to waste.
We then ship that meals to 65+ meals pantries, shelters, senior facilities, and residential supply and youth applications who’re feeding neighborhood members in want, from Santa Maria to Carpinteria. We tackle meals insecurity, scale back meals waste and greenhouse fuel emissions, and supply nutrient dense produce to these in our county who would possibly in any other case not have entry.
Q: How is your nonprofit primarily funded and what are your biggest wants?
A: All that Veggie Rescue does to nourish our neighborhood is freed from cost, being on name seven days every week offering farmers the transportation to take advantage of produce that might in any other case not be offered, and delivering meals to nonprofits doing charitable feeding all through Santa Barbara County.
We depend on contributions and grants to assist 100% of our operations. Our greatest expense, and biggest want, is to maintain our small fleet of two refrigerated vans and a refrigerated van, rolling, and to pay our three part-time drivers to maintain making all of it occur.
Q: How has COVID-19 impacted your nonprofit?
A: Working as a nonprofit since 2011, Veggie Rescue began as an all-volunteer gleaning program, with volunteers harvesting on small farms, orchards and backyards, and donating as much as 50,000 kilos of gleaned produce per 12 months to a couple nonprofits within the Santa Ynez Valley and Santa Barbara.
Although we nonetheless have volunteers gleaning, through the years we transitioned to having a small group of paid drivers selecting up harvested meals from small farms, farmers markets and companies and delivering produce and high-quality ready meals to a rising variety of nonprofits all through SB County.
Then, in 2020, with the rise within the quantity of meals waste within the restaurant provide chain, with a rising variety of our county residents in want of assist, Veggie Rescue diversified our meals rescue program past our conventional farmer partnerships. These adjustments included partnering with a nationwide restaurant provide firm to get well ready and packaged meals, delivering meals ready for charitable feeding, and on the whole ramping up the quantity of meals rescued from 139,000 kilos to 516,000 kilos, a rise of 275% in a single 12 months.
This was the equal of $900,000 price of meals, and 430,000 meals. In 2021, we’ve continued so as to add new farmer companions and nonprofit recipients, and are on monitor to rescue over 550,000 kilos of meals. This new degree of operations, which we don’t see lowering, was supported by authorities stimulus funding and the generosity of native residents by way of COVID-19 emergency reduction grants, has elevated our working bills by $90,000 per 12 months, or 47%.
Along with the expansion in our meals restoration program, in April 2020 Veggie Rescue was ready to answer a necessity within the city of Los Alamos, which was making an attempt to determine the way to feed residents most impacted by misplaced jobs. Having not too long ago accomplished the construct of our first cellular photo voltaic refrigeration prototype, we lent our Photo voltaic Cooler to The Los Alamos Basis. This allowed them to create and function a meals pantry for its city residents, utilizing the Photo voltaic Cooler to take supply of each Foodbank of SB and Veggie Rescue meals donations from April 2020 – April 2021.
Q: In what methods does your nonprofit put it to use’s funding?
A: Veggie Rescue is made up of a small, however agile, employees. With simply two full-time and three part-time workers, the vast majority of our funding goes to retaining our small fleet on the street, and our three part-time drivers selecting up meals from farms, farmers markets
and companies. Our high-touch mannequin, that focuses on profiting from rescued meals, entails delivering to 65+ small nonprofits, from Carpinteria to Santa Maria and Guadalupe, delivering solely what every nonprofit has area to refrigerate and make use of.
Q: How do folks become involved/volunteer to your nonprofit?
A: Anybody who desires to know extra about Veggie Rescue can attain us by way of our website, or ship a be aware to [email protected].
There are a number of methods for folks to become involved with Veggie Rescue.
- Get added to our Gleaning Volunteer listing, which is how we attain out when small farms or owners have produce that must be picked or harvested, after which donated.
- Get added to the Cooking Volunteer listing to assist scale back meals waste and improve entry for these most weak in our neighborhood to nutritious ready meals.
- We’re rising! And, searching for folks excited about becoming a member of a committee to assist hold us related to the communities we serve, develop our applications, and unfold the phrase in regards to the work we do.
Thanks to our farmers! (Veggies Rescue photograph)
Q: What makes your nonprofit totally different from others?
A: Veggie Rescue has the privilege of creating a distinction in our neighborhood in many various methods. We tackle meals insecurity by offering feeding applications with domestically grown produce and high-quality ready meals. This 12 months we’re on monitor to ship 466,000 meals, or $980,000 price of meals that might in any other case go to waste, to nonprofits all through the county.
We imagine there’s sufficient contemporary produce for everybody and other people in want may be related with contemporary produce outdoors of the standard market. We offer free entry to contemporary produce that low-income households and seniors residing on a hard and fast earnings could in any other case not be capable to afford.
We care in regards to the well being of our neighborhood, and search out partnerships with applications which might be in a position to put together wholesome meals from the produce we rescue, in addition to present diet and cooking training to assist households shift to extra wholesome consuming habits.
And at last, we scale back meals waste. Meals waste within the U.S. makes use of 14% of our water, makes up 24% of our landfill, and causes 4% of the greenhouse gasses generated in our nation.
Q: What’s one finest saved secret or enjoyable reality about your nonprofit that not everybody is aware of?
A: One little recognized secret is that being a driver for Veggie Rescue is likely one of the finest jobs in Santa Barbara County. You get to work open air with no laptop in sight, go to farms and farmers markets to select up meals being donating, then go across the county.
Q: Are you able to inform us one short-term objective AND one long-term objective that your nonprofit has for the following 12 months?
A: One short-term objective is to proceed to optimize our collaboration with the SYV Neighborhood Kitchen, the place contemporary, rescued produce is made into nutritious meals by volunteers after which distributed by Veggie Rescue to nonprofits feeding folks in want who could not have entry to a kitchen.
Our objective is to doc all that we study alongside the best way to share, by way of the newly created SBCFAN web site, with different neighborhood kitchens in Santa Barbara County, to make it simpler for others to start out applications like this. One long-term objective is to additional scale back meals waste by creating an upcycled product created from rescued meals or edible byproducts, and promoting it to create some earned earnings to assist our free providers.
Click here to assist Veggie Rescue’s mission to enhance the diet and high quality of life for neighborhood members who’re combating meals insecurity by offering them with wholesome, native produce and high-quality ready meals
