Johnson County Hunger Alliance: Collaborating to Increase Mobile Services
Founded: June 2017
Mission: To end hunger in our community by providing access to wholesome foods to those in need and by promoting solutions to the underlying causes of hunger through collaboration, education and advocacy
Since their beginning, Johnson County Hunger Alliance (JCHC) has been working to bring healthy food options to Johnson County Seniors. This is why they partnered with TAFB (Tarrant Area Food Bank) to bring TAFB mobile food programs, including Senior Share and Mobile Pantries to communities in the county. In the course of a year, they have established 10 working mobile service sites in various communities in and around Johnson County, serving over 2,500 people, with 3 more additional sites pending. Four of the sites are Mobile Food Pantries, which serve the entire community rather than just targeting Seniors. This model works well in smaller communities and provides benefits to the whole community, while helping to address transportation barriers. The other 6 locations are Senior Share sites, which are typically located at senior living centers and apartment complexes where there is an established social or service group available to volunteer and help run the site.
Each site runs once a month and provides fresh produce, dairy, and proteins that are set up like a farmer’s market. This additional food is meant to supplement the food received at pantries. For example, Senior Share sites typically offer 10 different items with clients taking home around 25 lbs. of fresh food. Clients have the flexibility of going to any of the 10 sites and may attend more than one site in a month. In addition, all mobile service sites are partnered with a TAFB pantry where excess food is taken in the same community.
JCHC received a Texas Health Resource grant through the Johnson County United Way to address food insecurity and depression in two specific zip codes in Johnson County. This funding supported the establishment of Senior Shares in both zip codes and supported a collaboration with Texas AgriLife Extension to implement cooking classes and provide clients recipes for items received.
Moving forward, the coalition has identified items for improvement in implementing these mobile services. First, they realize that some sites located near one another hold their monthly mobile service events in the same week. They plan to be more strategic in the scheduling of the events in the future by staggering the dates of the events so that it gives clients more options throughout the month. The second item they will be addressing in the near future is to implement the use of “’proxy pals’ where participants can designate another person to pick up their food for them if they are unable to attend themselves. JCHC will need to develop guidelines to support sites in implementation, but find the effort worth the benefit of increasing access to the mobile services. Lastly, they plan to continue their partnership with AgriLife Extension to offer more cooking classes and nutritional education.
Author: Brooke Dal Santo
2/14/2020
