Every Tuesday morning, a long line of people wait outside of Faith in Christ Ministries. People come with empty carts and leave with enough groceries to feed a family for at least half a week. At 9 a.m., administrator Gwynn Browne gives everyone a number indicating who can get in first. People get inside in an orderly manner. Pastries, vegetables, frozen meat, snacks are handed out by volunteers standing at each table.
This is the free food program the ministries provides. The ministries started this program 10 years ago. They now serves a minimum of 60 families per week with an average household ranging from 4-6 persons. Everyone who comes can get free food, no matter whether they belong to the church or not. People who don’t have a place to cook or store food, usually people who live on the street or shelter, can get a “homeless bag”, inside which are ready-to-eat food.
Since 2017, the ministries have been partnered with Food Finders, an organization that connects donated perishable food to nonprofit pantries and shelters. Food Finders connected them with Ralph's, the grocery store, Amtrak, a passenger railroad service and a catering business which caters food to Scopely, an entertainment company with around 400 employees. Volunteer drivers of the ministries pick up food from these places once a week. There have been other organizations that Food Finders have connected them with, but due to limited manpower, currently the ministries only gets food from these sources.
At 6 a.m. every Monday, volunteer driver CJ Browne arrives at the Amtrak Commissary pickup location. He carries boxes of sandwiches, breads and drinks to the trunk of his car and drives to the ministries. He then sorts through the food and puts them into the refrigerator. Other volunteers come and give out those food the next day.
Listen to Gwynn Browne of Faith in Christ Ministries talks about how the ministries help the community
Faith in Christ, a church founded in 1981, moved to its current location in South Los Angeles 27 years ago. Led by Pastor Joe Browne and his wife Gwynn Browne, the ministries have been serving this community which demonstrates a great need for help. Over the years, they’ve seen a need that people tend to run out of money sometime and struggle in buying enough food for basic needs. Among them are people who are paid minimum wages, senior citizens who relied on a fixed income, people who aren't here legally and people who abuse drugs or alcohol. The free food program started to meet the needs of the community.
In the early days, the ministries received canned food donations for the most part. But in recent years, they are receiving more fresh food, including fresh frozen meat. “I mostly come here for meat, because not a lot of places give away meat,” said John Little. He retired from Food 4 Less two years ago, and receives a pension that is less than what he earned before. “Getting free food here helps my budget a lot,” he said.
Wayne Daniel gets disability benefits in the CalFresh Program, known federally as SNAP, which provides monthly food benefits to individuals and families with low-income. He usually uses his CalFresh benefits to buy vegetables at grocery stores and come to the ministries for other groceries. “I’ve been coming here for around five years,” Daniel said. “Their food supply stays pretty stable.”
Food is feeding people’s stomach and also reminds people who are in difficulty that there’s a chance for a better tomorrow. It lifts the stress of a person unsure whether he is going to eat tomorrow. At the ministries, food serves to connect people and bring the community together. “From time to time we'll hear from someone who says, thank you for being there and thank you for letting me know I'm being cared,” said Browne. With the physical and emotional support people get from here, some realize that they deserve better and they've gone on to do better.
“One of our members who is very active in volunteering with us now, she used to live on the streets herself because she was addicted to drugs. When she came here for food, we continued to encourage her, telling her she was better than that,” Browne said. “And finally she got to the point that she got off drugs.”
People who get help from Faith in Christ Ministries are an epitome of 1.2 million food-insecure people in Los Angeles County. According to the 2017 data from Feeding America, Los Angeles County is home to the largest estimated population of food-insecure people in the country, accounting for 11.2% of the total population. The number of child facing food insecurity in LA County reached 18.2% in 2017. Food insecurity means people have limited access to the quality and quantity of food that is necessary to live a healthy life, and they are unsure of how and when they will obtain their next quality meal.
However, many households that experience food insecurity do not qualify for federal nutrition programs. Research data by Massachusetts Institute of Technology shows that the living wage deemed necessary to meet the basic needs of a family of four in LA County is $70,000 to $80,000. But students from households(with a size of four) with income below $32,630 can be eligible for free school meal program. For CalFresh, the largest food program in California that help disadvantaged individuals and families to afford nutritious food, the maximum allowable income is $50,208. For families who fall into the gap between the necessary living wage and program eligibility, local food banks and other hunger relief organizations might be the only places that they can get support.
This year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has proposed several changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Program that are highly likely to suppress enrollment. The USDA approved a rule change on Dec 4. The rule change affects people between the ages of 18 and 49 who are childless and not disabled. Approximately 688,000 people would lose access to food stamps because of the change.
Rescue Surplus Food
While so many people still live in hunger, in the United States, over one-third of safe and edible food goes uneaten. Organizations like Food Finders are working to rescue foods from ending up in landfills and send them to people in need. Faith in Christ Ministries is one of the 400 pantries and agencies throughout Southern California which get food from Food Finders. Approximately 22,000 meals are distributed daily by Food Finders.
Christopher Wong is food donor coordinator of Food Finders. One of his duties is to reach out to restaurants and groceries that are not donating surplus food. “I would set up meetings with food businesses and discuss the types of benefits they would receive as a donor, as well the types of laws that protect them,” said Wong. “I would then walk them through the different steps that they'll need to take to be able to donate food.”
“Once we set up the schedule, we align them with either volunteer or our staff or one of our partners that we provide the food to. That’s how we coordinate the pickup and delivery,” Wong introduced.
A report conducted by researchers at the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic found that one key barrier that keep potential donors away is a lack of knowledge regarding safety procedures for food donations. Businesses often do not know about the types of foods that can be donated, and the procedures that must be followed to safely donate surplus food. Questions like how food products should be stored or packaged, whether the food need to be transported in a refrigerated vehicle, and what labeling requirements must be met for donated food, keep confusing potential donors.
Many food businesses also choose not to donate due to a fear that they may be held liable if there were any safety problems of the donated food. However, the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act has been in place protecting good faith food donors from civil and criminal liability since 1996. California state-level laws provide similar protections. Even though, according to a 2016 survey by the Food Waste Reduction Alliance, businesses identified liability concerns as a barrier to donation.
Food Finders is working to eliminate that barrier to recover surplus food and reduce food waste. Wong said some businesses are interested in setting up a process and donating food, while it requires more effort to get other businesses to really see the benefit in donating. In order to sign up reluctant food businesses, he would explain the tax incentives for food donations and the laws protecting donors, and also help resolve other confusion. Five hundred participating businesses are now working with Food Finders in the food donation program, and that number continues growing.
Most of the big grocery chains have already been donating products not fit for sale but safe for consumption for years. According to Trader Joe’s, they have a designated Donation Coordinator at each store, whose responsibilities include caring for donated products from their handling to their delivery to food recovery partners. They said that their donations programs are effective at minimizing waste.
Wong said for some groceries who are donating, there are still opportunities to donate more,
in terms of making sure that every staff working there knows and follows the guidelines of donation. “Maybe some departments are donating more than others. They might be donating bakery items, but maybe not necessarily other products,” Wong said. “It is easier to compost some products rather than having them sorted through.” The goal of getting all available surplus food donated is not achieved yet in some grocery stores.
Food Finders is one of the members of the Food Waste Prevention and Rescue Working Group of the LA Food Policy Council (LAFPC). The LAFPC represents over 300 organizations, working to make Southern California a place where food is healthy, affordable, fair and sustainable. They are working together to eliminate food waste. Besides organizations focus on food resources recovery for human consumption like Food Finders, others have different focus: diverting food waste for livestock food, energy and compost; promoting and educating about food waste reduction practices.
Let's Meet Food Finders
Volunteers
Every nonprofit organization’s operation is supported by a huge number of volunteers. Food Finders rely on volunteers to pick up and distribute food to their partner agencies and sort out food during holiday seasons.
“I have volunteers fill out what they’re interested in, such as sorting and boxing, food collection and delivery, special events,” Sokha Ny, Volunteer Coordinator of Food Finders said. “The one who do what we need the most, which is to pick up and deliver food, are mostly seniors. And the rest of the volunteers are college students and high school students.”
At Faith in Christ Ministries, volunteers come to get ready for giving out foods on Tuesday. Some come on Saturday to cook breakfast to serve the community. “When volunteers come and if they like the way we do things because we try to keep things orderly, they might want to stay,” said Gwynn Browne, administrator of the ministries. “That kind of atmosphere keeps people coming back to that. They can be of service and they can help somebody else feel good and it makes them feel good.”
Jack Wright has been volunteering at the ministry for six years. He wants to help and show people that life can change. “Some people live amongst the darkness, and they believe in it. They believe this is the world this is what it has to be, but it's not the truth,” Wright said.
This community is filled with an abundance of needs, poverty, hopelessness, drugs issues. When Wright comes to volunteer on Saturday breakfast, he sits and talks to people. Some of people coming for breakfast live in shelters or on the streets. Wright said he wants to be that one person who sits down and cares about them. It is possible that this is the only care these people receive during the day, maybe the week, or maybe the month. “I feel good because I've done something to make the world a better place. I've done something to shine a light in someone's life,” he said.