Seed to Tree
February 27, 2018
February 27, 2018
January 22, 2018
As a security guard in San Francisco, David’s job is to protect life and property. It’s somewhat ironic that at home, he and his family face another serious threat: hunger.
“My salary is decent,” said the 62-year-old father of three. “But with kids and living in this city, where it’s so expensive, I’m finding more and more that it’s simply not enough.”
David’s story is one told all too often in this city. A recent report from the California Budget and Policy Center finds that San Francisco tops the list of most expensive counties in California when trying to support a family. For example, a family of four, with two working parents, needs to earn about $111,000 a year to simply cover the basics of rent, food, healthcare, transportation, child care and taxes. Marin County ranks second at $110,000 a year. Both figures far outweigh what David is taking home in his paycheck.
“My wife is unable to work right now, so it’s up to me to support her and the kids,” he says. Two of those kids are high school boys. The third is David’s 13-year-old 8th grade daughter, Shreena, who attends James Denman Middle School in the city’s Balboa Park neighborhood. It’s here where he and his family find a little bit of relief. For the past several months, they have been accessing the Health Children’s pantry on campus, picking up a bag filled with fresh produce, protein, and staple grains every week.
David is most impressed with all the fresh produce they are able to get at the pantry. “The kids love all the fruit – the apples, pears, and oranges. I like the fresh vegetables,” he says excitedly. “The best part is that some of the food lasts for several days. Some of the items, like the chicken, I’m able to freeze when I get home and cook it a couple of days later.
In the end, David figures the Food Bank is saving him and his family a couple hundred dollars a month. With teenagers who are constantly growing out of clothes and shoes, that money seems to disappear quite regularly. Still, it’s a comfort for him knowing that every Thursday afternoon he’ll be able to get a grocery bag filled with healthy food if he needs it.
“Some people say that it’s a waste of time to help the people of this city who can’t afford to feed themselves. I say that’s not right,” David says. “We are all making this community better in our own way, and it’s important to protect that.”
November 1, 2017
We are happy to report that there is a lot to celebrate from California’s 2017 legislative session.
At the beginning of the year, our Policy and Advocacy Team set our sights on 11 bills and two budget issues that we knew could improve food access for our neighbors in need. Throughout the year we wrote letters to our legislators in Sacramento, encouraged our supporters to call their own legislators, and even testified at hearings in the Capitol. And thanks to our partners at the California Association of Food Banks, the California Food Policy Advocates, and the Western Center on Law and Poverty – among many organizations – we saw several important victories in our collective goal to end hunger. Here are some of the highlights:
You, as supporters of the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, empower our Policy & Advocacy team to advance legislation and policies that improve food assistance at the local, state and national level. For that we say thank you.
Click here to sign up for our Advocacy Alerts, so that you can help us to advocate at critical moments in the legislative session in 2018!
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