Newsletter - September, 2007

WE'RE DOING GREAT

The Volunteer Way Food Bank is doing great, we are starting food drives throughout Pasco County to bring in more non-perishable food for our 5,380 families that are signed up to pick up food at our food bank. If we have learned anything at all, it is never put all your eggs in one basket. We have three sources of receiving food for our 80 food pantries and soup kitchens at this time. Every day we have more new hunger relief ministries come to us from all over Florida to receive food for their food pantries and soup kitchens. Unfortunately, there are very few food banks that give all their food free to hunger relief charities. Last year we distributed 5,000,000 pounds of food and never asked for any fees - this is why these hunger outreaches rely on The Volunteer Way to continue to serve the hungry families in their communities.

By the time you read this newsletter, we will have already hired Martha O’Brien as the assistant C.E.O. Martha graduated from University of Santander, Colombia. Her work experience includes Regional Sales Manager for Dosatron International, Project Manager in Clearwater, USA Global, Executive Manager, Inter-American Community Affairs in Miami. Martha also had a burden for serving her community, she volunteered at the following charities: Pasco County SPCA as a coordinator for Junior volunteer program, TESA in Largo as accounting, quarterly and yearly reports and CADASA in Fairfield, IA as Advocate for victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Martha is well rounded to be able to handle the many diverse programs The Volunteer Way performs in Pasco County. WELCOME ABOARD MARTHA!

Some of Martha’s duties will be to run a food drive every month throughout Pasco County. The name of our food drive will be “KIDS AGAINST HUNGER” and we expect an additional 500,000 pounds of non-perishable food each year. She will also manage our fundraisers, both locally and throughout Florida. Martha will be working on a five year business plan to bring The Volunteer Way to the next level.

Our food bank has many growing pains, some good and some not so good, but we always count these growing pains as opportunities to grow and build a stronger charity that can help more underserved people of our society. Organizations that do not have challenges are organizations that are stagnant and probably ready to close their doors. We have some successes and we have some failures - we never dwell on our failures but go forward with our successes. When you believe so strongly in what your doing, as we believe in The Volunteer Way, never stop doing what you believe is the right thing to do. I have been volunteering to help feed nutritionally challenged people for over 21 years and I will be volunteering for another 21 years if the Lord tarries. We are the only food bank in Pasco County that gives all their food and personal items free of any fees to other hunger relief charities and 5,800 hungry families of Pasco County.

We will be expanding many of our programs. Please pray for us to keep focused on our vision and to be humble in our service to our communities.

Be Blessed,
Lester

“Be The Change: Encourage Bold Thinking In Your Community”