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LAS CRUCES - It's been years since the local food bank has been able to take dented cans of soup or bushels of apples just beginning to bruise, hamstrung by store policies on insurance and liability.
All that is set to change, says Rebecca Renteria, director, since 1999, of Las Cruces' Casa de Peregrinos emergency food bank, which distributes up to 106 emergency boxes of food a day, 38,000 boxes in all in 2010.
The Community Action Agency of Southern New Mexico is handing over its food bank operations to Albuquerque-based Roadrunner Food Bank of New Mexico, which will announce today the start of direct food distribution throughout Do-a Ana, Grand, Luna and Hidalgo counties at its warehouse, 2001 Copper Loop. The two organizations have already been working together for six years.
Roadrunner "has food we don't have access to right now, a lot of food from Walmart, from Sam's, a lot of different stores," Renteria said. "For years, we haven't been able to get anything from them. They were throwing it in the trash. (Roadrunner) gets it in big quantities."
Not only that, but the new structure will allow food banks like Casa de Peregrinos to buy more fresh and varied food more frequently, perhaps three times a week, instead of once.
"Potatoes, lettuce, cabbages, strawberries, I mean good, good, good food, fresh food," Renteria said. "The clients are really, really happy when they see that we have produce."
Roadrunner, a nonprofit organization, sells the food to aid agencies
"A basic food box, we purchase with donations: flour, beans, rice, baking powder, cheese, corn tortillas, margarine, lard, and all the food drives from the community, churches and groups (contribute) canned goods, cereals, pastas," Renteria said. But that's not a consistent supply, and recipients can only come once a month. "Maybe you get four boxes (of canned goods) from a church drive over the weekend. That will go really quick in the morning. That's where Community Action would come in."
The need is especially high right now, Renteria said, with 2,000 more people seeking assistance in 2010 compared to 2009.
"Our numbers have gone up, among the working families - not the elderly - but a dad and a mom and they have to work, they don't have unemployment," she said. "We have had our numbers go up significantly."
Roadrunner hopes to distribute 500,000 pounds of food in the first months of 2011, spokeswoman Sonya Warwick said.
"New Mexico continues to be ranked (among states) as one of the highest, in poverty rates," Warwick said.
As part of assuming responsibility of CAA's Las Cruces warehouse, Roadrunner has started hiring employees and intends to begin distributing food to soup kitchens, food pantries and shelters by the end of the month. Still to be determined is how many southern New Mexico residents are in need of its services, Warwick said, but a just-completed hunger study found that 40,000 New Mexico residents are served by Roadrunner's partner food banks every week.
"The shocking thing from that study: More than 40 percent of those we're helping are children," Warwick said. Another study, completed last fall, found Do-a Ana County residents with incomes less than twice of the federal poverty level - almost 83,000 people - miss 11 percent of their meals and are only able to pay for a third of their food needs. More than one half of this population's meals come from public sources, including food stamps and school lunches. Roadrunner's goal "is to try to close that gap," Warwick said.
Ashley Meeks can be reached at (575) 541-5462.
Face of hunger
•The average monthly income of an emergency food recipient is $900
•More than 90,000 children are fed by Roadrunner every year
•Almost one-third of households served by Roadrunner include at least one employed adult
•More than 40 percent of food recipients have a household member in poor health
•More than 40 percent of seniors receiving government benefits need food assistance
•Only 8 percent of Roadrunner clients are homeless
•The need for emergency food has risen 30 percent to 40 percent in recent years, a rate not seen since the Great Depression
Source: Roadrunner Food Bank
If you go
•What: Nonprofit organization Roadrunner Food Bank of New Mexico announces new area food-distribution plan
•When: 1:30 p.m. today
•Where: Roadrunner's food-distribution warehouse, 2001 Copper Loop
•Info: Nonprofit agencies interested in partnering with Roadrunner can call (505) 349-8845; residents interested in helping or donating can visit www.rrfb.org or call (505) 247-2052.
