Foodbank of Santa Barbara County

The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County's mission is to end hunger and transform the health of Santa Barbara County through good nutrition. It has served as the leading food distribution and hunger relief organization in the region since 1982. Foodbank partners with a network of over 300 nonprofit agencies, including health programs, religious organizations, and schools to serve low income (below federal poverty level) residents throughout Santa Barbara County. From warehouses in Santa Barbara and Santa Maria, Foodbank distributes over 10 million pounds of fresh produce and nutritious groceries each year. Foodbank functions as a critical safety net for the approximately 1 in 4 people who experience hunger in the county each year, or 229,200 unduplicated clients in the pandemic and economic crisis of FY19?20.

Moving the Commmunity from Hunger into Health.

Goal One: Marketing, Development, Culture Utilizing tools of branding, marketing and communications to build brand value in the community; to inspire the community to support the Foodbank in time and funds.

Goal Two: Programs and Educational Impact Create systems and structure for all Programs, ensure continuous improvement of program curriculum, and increase outreach to individuals who are most vulnerable.

Goal Three: Disaster Preparedness Improve and train with all community stakeholders in: resiliency, response and recovery.

The Foodbank partners with Leading From Within, an organization dedicated and committed to investing in leaders to make meaningful changes on complex community challenges in Santa Barbara County, by bringing social sector leaders together to: grow as individuals and improve their effectiveness as leaders; sustain each other as peers to keep leading and learning, and to increase collaboration for the common good. The Foodbank has invested in the partnership by sponsoring in time and funds to 10 senior and mid level management positions (90%).

The Disaster Feeding Plan, developed with government, emergency response, health care, education, business and nonprofits countywide was published in November 2019; training occurred in January 2020, and in March 2020, the plan's core tenets of collaboration and providing food at or near people's homes guided our COVID-19 response. We established partnerships, protocols and certification to open 54 SAFE Food Net sites, including more than 20 no-contact drive-thru locations, providing 65,000 to 84,000 lbs. of food distributions each day. Seniors under mandatory quarantine and households facing severe medical situations needed food taken to their doors. Hundreds of our volunteer drivers made over 21,000 home deliveries. Enrollment in our senior food program for low-income seniors rose from 1,300 to 3,300. Foodbank operations more than doubled food distributions, and the increase in demand was met in a variety of ways: Our ops team prioritizes relationships across the entire food supply chain. From growers and distributors to wholesale and retail outlets, Foodbank staff collaborate on the local, regional, state and national levels to get healthy food to those who need it. Food waste reduction is also key to our sourcing process. Grocery rescue in ongoing, and when COVID-19 struck, we coordinated with distributors to reroute food that suddenly had nowhere to do due to restaurant and school closures. When Farmers to Families (F2F) - the federal Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP) launched, we supported organizations like The Berry Man, Inc. to participate. F2F provided 1.2 million pounds of fresh fruit and veggies to those we serve, in addition to our regular distributions. As a member of Feeding America, the nationwide network of 200 food banks, and the California Association of Food Banks, we leveraged large-scale opportunities to bring in more nutritious food.