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Hunger Ingenuity

A Food Bank Summit

By June 17, 2015July 16th, 2018No Comments

Our member food banks, meal programs, and shelters are the foundation for so much of Food Lifeline’s work. Scattered across Western Washington, these programs work hard every day to make sure people in your neighborhood get the food or meal they need. In fact, 35% of our member agencies are staffed entirely by volunteers!

That makes it even more special when we have a chance to offer workshops, education and professional development. On June 5th, representatives from 20 Food Lifeline member agencies and other partner organizations gathered in Mount Vernon for our first ever regional workshop.

Food bank and meal program staff, volunteers, and board members discussed agency capacity, shared successes and challenges with each other, learned about government funding opportunities available to build agency capacity, and heard from peers who have experienced seeking government funding.

Workshop participants, most of whom were from agencies based in Snohomish, Skagit, Whatcom, and Island Counties, appreciated the shorter commute time to the event. In the past, Food Lifeline has done a big conference in Seattle, but we’ve switched to more intimate, regionally-focused workshops for the next couple of years.

But you don’t have to take our word for it; here are four quotes from workshop participants:

“I walked in completely ignorant on most of these subjects, I feel empowered to pursue improvement in my organization and start pursuing funding.”

“[The workshop was helpful because it gave me] the opportunity to network and collaborate with other food banks experiencing similar barriers.”

“Thanks for doing this regionally. We have never to able to attend in the past due to time constraints.”

“Very informative and better in a smaller group for better dialogue”

Several more regional workshops are planned for the coming months. Your support makes these workshops possible for our member agencies. Thank you.