Mobile Pantry Food distribution

This was an overwhelming event.  There were 400 people waiting in line in the dark cold when I got there waiting to get into the church.  The parking lot was sheer ice and treacherous.  They let us in an we set up stuff with no clue about how events would unfold.  As people came in we gave them our questionnaire but there was hesitancy about when to collect it.  We had to maintain order and keep people in line to turn in it.  We also ran a lottery for tee shirts and cook books which was very popular. People kept on stopping by and saying they wanted a tee shirt.  We collected surveys for the next four and one half hours.  It was chaotic and exhausting!  So many people were in bad shape.  Some couldn't read. Many were physically challenged.  Most people were missing teeth.  Many were overweight.  Families were there too.  We met refugees from Burma (Myanmar), Somalia, Tanzania and other places.  It was a pretty sobering experience.  A couple of people said our survey made them depressed because we asked about nutritional hardships.  We collected a ton of surveys but will need to judge the quality.   We gave out almost all of the compensation money which people really appreciated.  Pictures will follow.  They finally put us in the chapel to control the flow of people.  They were still distributing groceries to a long line of people when we left at noon.  Hope everyone got some food.  There is just such real need!

The Communication Department Haven House Family

Wow!  We did good here :)  Glad to be affiliated with our wonderful department!

Food Deserts Redux

Next Saturday we will collect data from 500 inner city residents for the nutritional stigma project!  This is such an awesome opportunity.  We send out a loud shout to our chair, Jim Dearing, for finding some money for this exceptionally worthwhile project.  We will be at a food distribution event sponsored by the Lansing Mobile Food Pantry.  It is sobering to understand how many people in Lansing need food and might otherwise go hungry.  This is good work to be doing.