News in 2008

TCU HUNGER WEEK BREAKS ALL RECORDS

GENEROUS DONOR TO MAIL CARRIERS' FOOD DRIVE GREW UP HUNGRY

TARRANT AREA FOOD BANK NAMES OUTSTANDING VOLUNTEERS

AMERICAN IDOL "GIVES BACK" GRANT COMES TO FOOD BANK

2008 News Archive                Quarterly Newsletter

2007 News Archive               

REPORT

TCU Hunger Week breaks all records

Student, faculty and staff response this year to the annual Hunger Week at Texas Christian University in April broke all previous records for the food/fund drive. Various events raised $55,346 as well as 4,660 pounds of food!  This generous gift will allow Tarrant Area Food Bank to provide food for 280,371 meals.

Congratulations! on your success and thank you for opening your hearts to Texans in need.  

FEATURE

Generous donor to mail carriers’ food drive grew up hungry

2008 Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive set for Saturday, May 10

Fort Worth letter carrier Patrick Woods had noticed for several years that one of the customers on his route always set out an unusually large quantity of food for the one-day Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive sponsored by the National Association of Letter Carriers and its local branches.

“The bags of groceries covered up her porch and the stairs to it,” Woods said. When he thanked the customer for her generosity, she told him, “I grew up hungry, and I don’t like to think of anyone going hungry.”

The customer, Ms. Phyllis Jarvis of Fort Worth ’s Meadowbrook neighborhood, recalls how her mother was left to provide for six children after Phyllis’s father died of a brain tumor when she was only seven years old. “We took baloney sandwiches to elementary school for as long as I can remember,” she said. “We were so excited when the school milk program started in the late 1950’s. We always drank water with our sandwiches. We had milk at home, but it was wonderful to have milk at school,” she said.

Jarvis, who recently retired from Southwestern Bell after 30 years, donates “the basics like flour, sugar and tea,” and then adds pasta, beans, peanut butter and cereals. Last year she also donated laundry detergent, paper towels and toiletries. “I like to donate basic things people need,” she explained.

The NALC Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive is Saturday, May 10, the day before Mother’s Day. Postal customers can leave bags of food by their mailboxes for their letter carriers to pick up. Food donated in the greater Fort Worth area will go to Tarrant Area Food Bank. Last year, the drive brought more than 225,000 pounds to the Food Bank.

Foods most needed by Tarrant Area Food Bank for feeding hungry children and their families include canned meats and fish, canned vegetables, canned fruits, rice, pasta, cereals, boxed instant foods, peanut butter (no glass containers), baby formula, dried milk and food with pop tops for easy access by children.

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NEWS RELEASE

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Tarrant Area Food Bank to honor local beer distributor,

individuals and Canstruction® participants

as outstanding volunteers

Special treats will come from Mrs Baird’s

55-foot Ultimate Smoker and Grill parked on site

FORT WORTH, TX (April 16, 2008) – Tarrant Area Food Bank this month will honor its 3,000 volunteers and present awards for exceptional volunteerism to Larry Anfin of Coors Distributing Company of Fort Worth, to the Fort Worth Chapters of The American Institute of Architects and the Society of Design Administration and to Fort Worth community volunteers Barbara Williford and Corinne and Robert Dillon.

A reception honoring all food bank volunteers and recognizing the award recipients will be held Tuesday, April 22, 2008, between 3 and 5 p.m. at 2600 Cullen Street, Fort Worth 76107. Awards will be presented at 3:45 p.m. As a special treat for the volunteers, Mrs Baird’s 55-foot Ultimate Smoker and Grill will be onsite with staff cooking hotdogs and hamburgers.

Larry Anfin, president of Coors Distributing Company of Fort Worth will be presented the PAT MOHLER AWARD for his company’s exceptional service during annual food drives benefiting Tarrant Area Food Bank. The company is a major contributor of personnel and trucks that pick up food drive donations from major corporate and school drives, according to Susan Frye, the food bank’s community events director. “Coors has provided transportation during all of our annual food drives, including the mail carriers’ Stamp Out Hunger Drive in May,” she said.

“Larry has been an enthusiastic member of the food bank’s board of directors for almost five years. We can’t thank him enough for his very generous support,” said Bo Soderbergh, Tarrant Area Food Bank executive director. The Pat Mohler Award is named in honor of the food bank’s founding executive director.

The Fort Worth Chapters of The American Institute of Architects and the Society of Design Administration are the volunteer forces behind the annual Canstruction® Competition and Show that benefits Tarrant Area Food Bank. The exhibit features imaginative, colossal structures designed by professional architects and engineers and built entirely of cans and boxes of food. The AIA and SDA Canstruction® volunteers and participants will be presented the PATTIE VERKAMP VOLUNTEER FUNDRAISING/FOOD-RAISING AWARD for their management and promotion of this event.

“Since the first competition in 1999, Canstruction® has brought to Tarrant Area Food Bank almost 500,000 pounds of food and thousands of dollars,” said Frye. “The members of AIA and SDA who have coordinated this event and the architectural and engineering firms that have entered the competition have been incredibly generous with their time, talents and financial resources. This Volunteer Fundraising/Food-raising Award is a small token of our appreciation,” she said.

The award will be received on behalf of all Canstruction® volunteers and participants by Julie Meeks, president of the SDA Fort Worth Chapter, and Suzie Adams, executive director of the AIA Fort Worth Chapter.

Corinne and Robert Dillon's volunteer work the past three years behind the scenes of the Tarrant Area Food Bank benefit Empty Bowls “has more than earned them the DEBBY BROWN VOLUNTEER OF THE YEAR AWARD,” said Frye. “Corinne is chairwoman of the silent auction, and Bob, or ‘the dock guy’ as we call him,” Frye explained, “coordinates logistics and supervises the loading dock the day of the event as the pottery bowls, silent auction items and restaurant food come in.” Corinne also works in the Tarrant Area Food Bank office once a week and volunteers at one of the food bank’s partner agencies, Community Link Mission in Saginaw .

Mrs. Dillon’s volunteer work is inspired, in part, by her experience as a kidney transplant recipient five years ago. “A lot of people helped along the way,” she says. “I would not be where I am today if it weren’t for the help of other people.”

Barbara Williford, a Texas Christian University graduate and Alcon retiree who now enjoys time with seven grandchildren, will be presented the IMA STRAIN VOLUNTEER AWARD for her long-term, dedicated volunteer work for Tarrant Area Food Bank.

Mrs. Williford, who once worked in the hospitality industry, has volunteered at Tarrant Area Food Bank since 1998 when she helped with guest registration for the food bank’s first ¡Adiós, Hunger! party. She has volunteered for this event every year since. In addition, Mrs. Williford is the food bank’s “on-call volunteer,” according to JoAnn Biggers, Tarrant Area Food Bank volunteer coordinator.

“Barbara is the first person we call whenever we need a substitute receptionist for part of a day or an emergency volunteer to step in and take up where another volunteer has had to stop. She is an exemplary model of the long-term, dedicated volunteer deserving of the Ima Strain Volunteer Award,” Biggers said.

Last year, 3,000 VOLUNTEERS DONATED 66,000 HOURS OF SERVICE to Tarrant Area Food Bank in its efforts to eliminate local hunger.

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NEWS RELEASE

Tarrant Area Food Bank receives

American Idol grant to fight child hunger

FORT WORTH, TX (March 12, 2008) -- The television fundraising campaign “Idol Gives Back” that aired on Fox television network’s program "American Idol" has sent Tarrant Area Food Bank a check for $22,921 to combat child hunger.

This grant will help Tarrant Area Food Bank sponsor its weekend pantry program, BackPacks for Kids, at two new sites, Thornton Elementary in Arlington and Western Hills Elementary in Fort Worth.

BackPacks for Kids provides nonperishable, child-friendly foods for the weekend to elementary and middle-school students who, each Friday, take home food for themselves and their school-aged siblings in unmarked backpacks.

The "Idol Gives Back" grant was made possible by Charity Projects Entertainment Fund (CPEF), which was established to raise awareness of poverty across the United States and throughout the world. With this mission, CPEF teamed up with Fox and "American Idol" to present "Idol Gives Back," which aired in April 2007. "Idol Gives Back" was a two-night special that raised awareness and funds for organizations that provide resources for young people in extreme poverty in the U.S. and Africa.

Tarrant Area Food Bank received the grant as a result of its membership in America’s Second Harvest – The Nations Food Bank Network. America’s Second Harvest was chosen as one of four domestic charities that received funds which were raised through “Idol Gives Back.” America’s Second Harvest is the nation's largest hunger-relief organization, providing food and grocery products to more than 25 million Americans each year through a network of more than 200 food banks.

“We are extremely grateful for this support of our work in feeding hungry children,” said Bo Soderbergh, Tarrant Area Food Bank executive director.

“Each year, Tarrant Area Food Bank provides food to not quite half of the 118,000-plus children living at risk of hunger in Tarrant and 12 neighboring counties we serve," said Soderbergh.  "The “Idol Gives Back” grants will help us and other food banks across the country continue to help ensure that children do not go to bed hungry or wondering where their next meal will come from.”

Tarrant Area Food Bank, founded in 1982 to collect and distribute donated food, provides food in 13 counties to emergency pantries, Kids Cafes and other after-school programs, emergency shelters, senior centers, children's homes and other social service centers. Each month, this network of hunger-relief charities distributes emergency groceries to 35,000 families and serves 500,000 meals and snacks on charities' sites. To learn more, please visit www.tafb.org.

America's Second Harvest—The Nation's Food Bank Network is the largest charitable domestic hunger-relief organization in the United States. Through its Network of more than 200 Member food banks, America's Second Harvest annually provides assistance to more than 25 million people in need, including more than 9 million children and nearly 3 million seniors in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Each year, America 's Second Harvest secures and distributes more than 2 billion pounds of food and grocery products to support feeding programs at its member food banks, including Tarrant Area Food Bank. To learn more, please visit www.secondharvest.org .

Charity Projects Entertainment Fund (CPEF) is a charitable organization established to raise money and awareness to help combat extreme poverty in the U.S. and throughout the world, particularly in Africa. CPEF uses the power of entertainment to drive positive change to achieve its vision of creating a just world free from poverty. CPEF is inspired and supported by the UK charity that invented Red Nose Day.

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