Building awareness, one town at a time

One of the big hurdles in connecting food insecure families to free summer meals is building awareness about where and how to access the benefits.

Fortunately--as is often the case in life--when committed people go the extra mile, good things can happen.

Thanks in large part to Hunger Action Team member Sue Pinkham, participation in Bloomfield is way up, according to Jim Palma, a community network builder here at Foodshare.

Jim explained that Sue, who is director of food services for the Bloomfield Public Schools, cleverly inserted summer meals site information for her town into school menus during the last several weeks of classes. She also arranged to have meals offered on Saturdays at the two libraries in town.

The results? Here’s what Jim has to say:

“Sue is pleased to report a 40 percent increase in summer meals for the first week of operation compared to the first week of last summer. The figures are: 645 meals during the first week of 2015, and 915 meals during the first week of 2016. Congratulations to Sue and others who have been promoting summer meals in Bloomfield!”

You can read all about the Bloomfield program, including sites and times, in this Hartford Courant story.