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the future of food banks
and the people who serve themselves first
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written in blood
this post is narrated! listen below… “Every regulation is written in blood.” I’ve heard this saying in several contexts and it applies to every one. Most rules aren’t written until something bad happens. We require seatbelts in cars because thousands of people died without them. OSHA exists because
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three tales of courage
Last week, I said that our success in a system often means it’s tilted towards us. What I mean to say is that the systems that we live, work, and play in are arbitrary. There’s no reason they have to stay the way they are. For centuries, these
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what does it mean to put community first?
Some articles get my goat and don’t let go. Last year I read an interview with a roundtable of CEOs at major food banks around the country. The headline quote was, “we have power, let’s use it wisely.” I want to unpack that! The panelists, well-meaning or well-intentioned,
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transformational capacity building
I had the pleasure of writing a blog post with my friend and former colleague Sarah Benner-Kenagy. We wrote about Transformational Capacity Building for Community-Centric Fundraising. CCF is one of my favorite sites that explores and reimagines practices in the world of funding. Our article is about our experience funding
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whatever pops up
During the covid pandemic, service providers had to be in a lot of places, fast. We couldn’t rely on traditional models if we wanted to reach the people hardest hit by the virus. We needed to send covid-19 vaccines to places where there might not be an established health
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precedented times
We are living in precedented times. I know, we’ve all heard the opposite for the past two years. We have a once-in-a-century pandemic raging around the world. People are acting with entitled cruelty and rage, especially towards service workers. Millions of people have lost their lives for a teetering
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food bank 2061
this post is narrated! listen below… Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is well-known political figure in the House of Representatives. She is also an outspoken abolitionist. Last year she was among the people in power to join calls to defund the police. Ocasio-Cortez answers questions on her Instagram account pretty often. One
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we have no choice
One day I received an email from a colleague of mine. Someone from the community had reached out to her in search of food. He was living alone, disabled, unable to travel for food or stand in a line. A local church delivered groceries to the apartment where he lived.
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asking for ID in the surveillance age
The vast majority of us have internalized data collection as a fact of life. It feels natural, doesn’t it? I show my ID to get into a concert (those were the days!). The websites I browse collect huge amounts of data from me. Security cameras dot my periphery in
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centering people when collecting information
I have a stable job that pays me well. I live in a nice apartment with my husband. We can afford to buy the things we need. My job pays me to provide social services to others, but it’s not likely that I will ever need those services myself.
