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By Lisa Harmison, campaign coordinator
This year was the first year as an all-volunteer effort. We had eight volunteers on the steering committee along with three representatives of the local food pantries. We collected 2827.5 pounds of produce over the 12-week program (70% of last year's total). We had 16 volunteers collecting, sorting, and distributing the produce and 14 individual donors. This does not include the several vendors at the two Farmers Markets who donated heavily to our cause.
The core committee focused on providing simple recipes and tips for preparing and cooking the harvested vegetables and herbs. We provided each food pantry with several copies so visitors could take them home with them. We included slips of paper in the bags to aid in identifying the produce. These two actions were to address the feedback from the food pantries. We also fine-tuned the collection process for our volunteers and created a website. Thanks to Cate Clark for providing four aprons for Monday mornings.
Midway through the summer we added the Food at First program as one of our recipients. The Food at First program provides free meals to the needy through the week. This turned out to be a good partnership as we now had a place for the larger produce (like the 30 pound banana squash).
For 2006, we will try to do even better. We will start with a publicity meeting in January. We hope to promote the PARH program more through presentations and maybe free seeds. We will start collecting around the same time, the beginning of July. However, we will extend the collection time later into the fall. We will collect on the Saturday before Labor Day and deliver to the Food at First program since the food pantries are not open on Labor Day.
We will look into the community gardening program as well as the student organic farm. A student nutrition club has contacted me to share recipes so we hope to have more for next year.
We need to have two people, at least, who act as liaisons for the Farmers Market vendors. Our relationship with them needs improvement and consistency.
We also need to preprint labels for outside the bags. Bethesda prefers to no have herbs and MICA prefers not to have hot peppers. Food at First can take these as well as anything big or exotic. We will provide Food at First with a set of recipes.
I will contact the national level of PARH to get more receipts and plant stakes. We'll try to get a squash identification poster too. We will have a thermometer in the lobby at Reiman Gardens reflecting our progress. Volunteers are also welcome at Bethesda to help distribute and at Food at First. We'll have more details on these opportunities next summer.
A big thank you to all who help with the Plant a Row campaign:
Cate Clark, Shelly Dilks, Debbie Gitchell, Dale Grosvenor, Roy Hougen, Chuck Jons, Marianne Klinsky, Connie Middleton, Laura Miller, Linda Naeve, Diane Nelson, Deb Niehof, Joslin Peters, Denise Rupp, Logan Rupp. Taylor Rupp, Jo Simpson, Lynette Spicer, Scott Walker, Mary Wilkens, Barb Woods, Charlie Yoerger.
Ames Garden Club, Copyworks, Reiman Gardens, Story County 4-H, Story County Extension, Story County Master Gardeners Association, the Ames Fareway Grocery Store, Hy- Vee Grocery Store, and the vendors at the Downtown Ames Farmers Market and the North Grand Farmers Market.
Lastly, a big thank you to the many individuals in our community who donated extra produce to our program. We need more people like you to make a small donation that results in a big difference to help feed the hungry.